


Merry & Bright

by gooddaysunshine



Series: Hatchetfield Happies [5]
Category: Black Friday - Team StarKid, The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals - Team StarKid
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Awkward Flirting, Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Language, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Humor, I DIDN'T KNOW THAT WAS A TAG I LOVE IT, I really just wanted to write a Christmas fic bc I had a hankering, Jane is always dead my dude, Paulkins - Freeform, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, also Paul is a cat person and I will fight anyone on that., bc Emma swears like a sailor and no one can tell me otherwise, except for Jane
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-25
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:14:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 32,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26639377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gooddaysunshine/pseuds/gooddaysunshine
Summary: In a world where Emma picks up a part time seasonal gig as a mall elf, a crabby barista becomes an unpleasant elf, and Paul still finds himself smitten. A tale of Christmastime in Hatchetfield. Innit that fun?
Relationships: Alice/Deb (The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals), Paul Matthews/Emma Perkins
Series: Hatchetfield Happies [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1699126
Comments: 145
Kudos: 62





	1. Greetings From the Staff Parking Lot

**Author's Note:**

> I know I have two unfinished works, but I have a fully realized story here that I think I can bang out pretty quickly here. Also tutselutse and I had been talking about Emma being a mall elf and I haven't been able to think about writing anything else since. I've just really got to get this out of my system before returning to Merak, although I will likely add this into the Hatchetfield Happies series eventually because I plan on doing more with that bad boy with different timelines for sure.
> 
> Anyway! I hope you enjoy!

Emma did not like Christmas.

Christmas was Jane’s thing. All the garland and the lights. New ornaments every year. She remembered the emails coming through with the annual ornaments that showed up each year from Pier 1. One for her husband and son. Then she would get one for herself. The final newest addition to each year’s tree was one for Emma. They were always little things that would make her exhale a silent laugh. One year it had been a purple octopus with googly eyes. Another was a nutcracker made out of different pieces of twine with these crazy painted on eyes. Each year there was something new. Jane did that shit for ten whole years.

Ash fell in a graceful heap down to the asphalt of the Lakeside Mall parking lot. Emma took another drag off her cigarette. The smoke lingered in her mouth and burned at her throat. It was a habit she had picked up as a teenager. Partly to piss off her parents. Partly to make her goody two shoes sister disappointed. Largely to play into a role she felt she was being thrust into. Knucklehead kid. Delinquent. Burnout. Everything their parents cursed her to be despite every word Jane spoke against it. She breathed a cloud out into the cold early evening air. It rose and dispersed until she could no longer see it in the dank cloudy light that gently glowed around her. 

Why did she come back here?

A year ago, she was wandering around mountains and traipsing along beaches in Guatemala. Hell, she was content to live out the rest of her days with the sun in her hair, toes in the sand. She closed her eyes, willing herself to pretend for just a moment she was back there. Standing at the rim of a volcano. Wind blowing through her hair. Nothing but the smell of the earth filling her senses and the taste of freedom on her tongue. When she opened her eyes again, she just found herself staring out into the loading dock and staff parking lot behind the mall. With a groan, she stretched her legs out from the curb she had been sitting on. Nothing said lunch break like smoking at least five cigarettes and wishing she was quite literally anywhere but where she was.

“Are you okay?”

There usually weren't any other voices in the parking lot during her breaks. Save for the brooding girl from Toy Zone. Even then, there wasn’t more than a muttered greeting between the two. She liked that they could commiserate without having to say a single word. Just passive aggressive and apathetic drags off of cigarettes to express a mutual self loathing. Her eyes shifted from the mass of cars taking up the lot before her up to whoever was speaking to her. Brows knit together above wide eyes, and in that moment, it occurred to her how that picture must have looked. Sweater pulled over a tacky green and bright red nylon dress. Similarly colored tights leading down to green pointed shoe coverings. Shitty fake ears poking out between curls underneath an equally shitty floppy felt hat with a bell on the end. Like Santa’s sweatshop finally let her out after ten difficult years of hard labor. Not exactly the face of Christmas cheer, but in her defense, this man did not work at the mall yet was in the staff parking lot asking her if she was okay.

She narrowed her eyes. “You don’t work here,” she commented before taking another drag off her cigarette. At least, she was fairly certain he didn’t work there. He was tall and unassuming but had these bigass eyes that she would have remembered. Even if he was just one of those fucking weirdos who ran the Cinnabon on the far side of the mall. It was best to avoid the Cinnabon kiosk at all costs. Those who were drawn in by the sugary sweet temptation wafting out into the air seemed to return on a regular basis. Sometimes just for a bun. Coming back again and again without explanation. Like there was something addictive about the sweets. Like there was some almighty cinnabon overlord bringing these people back to his lair in an attempt to build his cult of shitty pastries. The fact of the matter was she avoided the place and the people who worked there at all costs, and she was nearly positive that he didn’t work there. But something about the eyes, large and blue and nervous, seemed vaguely familiar. “Do I know you?”

His cheeks were flushed pink, likely from the cold. He was only wearing a deep green sweater with the collar of a white button down peeking over the neckline. A burgundy scarf hung around his neck. A little underdressed for late November in Hatchetfield. Then again, she had a zip up sweater around her crappy costume and was sitting on the cold ground, literally freezing her ass off. “No,” he answered, a little too quickly. His eyebrows shot up. “I mean… no, I don’t think so. I… nope. No.”

She bit the inside her of her cheek to stop a laugh from coming out. He looked absolutely ridiculous. Eyebrows were raised just about up to his hairline. Cheeks were tinged a bright and uncomfortable red. Full lips were pressed into a tight line. Her eyes narrowed again. The scene felt a little  _ too _ familiar. “I  _ do _ know you,” she decided, snubbing out her cigarette on the curb next to her. A smirk hung lazily on her lips. 

“No, I don’t think so,” he reiterated with his voice becoming frantic. He shifted uncomfortably. The various bags in his hand crinkled. “Nope, we’ve never--”

“You’re the guy from Beanies.” She pointed directly up at his face. He froze, like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar. She was sure of it. He had to be the same guy who was a regular and had a very obvious and hopeless crush on her. Came in every single day without fail to order one thing and one thing only: one black coffee with a side of a very generous tip for her. It had to be him. He looked much more awake and casual, but the eyes gave him away. Bug-eyed and curious always. “The one with the black coffee.”

“I… um… do I know you from there?” He did. “I didn’t even recognize you.” Maybe the truth. “What are… what’re you doing at the mall… dressed like an elf?”

“Serving shitty coffee is my main gig. Making small children cry as a particularly unpleasant mall elf is just my passion project.” He snorted. A smile came over her, despite the general dismay she felt just being in the vicinity of the mall. That was the norm, though, when this square came in. There was always some sort of awkward small talk he managed to spit out. Then she would follow it up with something quick witted and funny, which would be met with a laugh from him. Polite conversation between patron and staff. Nothing more. “What’re you doing at the mall looking like  _ that?” _

Not that he looked like anything specifically. Just a guy going to the mall on a Saturday during the holiday season. Maybe a little more festive than the average dude rolling through, but nothing to write home about no less. It  _ was _ fun to make him squirm, though. He glanced down at his outfit. “What?” he replied frantically, glancing back up at her. “I don’t know. I know people think this sweater is ugly, but I thought it was nice. I guess--”

“I’m just fucking with you, dude,” she chuckled. His shoulders sagged with relief, a nice change of pace from his normal uptight posture. It was really silly to have noticed him at all, let alone taken his mannerisms into account. There was nothing remarkable about this man in the slightest. Just a normal relatively dorky average dude. But sometimes she actually found herself trying to pick out the least spitty pot of coffee for him when he rolled through some time after five during the week. “You here shopping for an entire family or…?” She jutted her chin out toward the mass of large bags in his hand.

He glanced down with raised brows at his haul. “Oh, no!” he spat out, not sounding convincing in the slightest. His brows furrowed. “Well… I guess? Kind of? I really just come here on Saturday nights for my… um… niece. She’s a senior at Hatchetfield High and really struggling in calculus and--”

“I don’t need your whole life story, my man.” The pounding in her head she felt when she had entered the building hours beforehand had subsided into a dull throbbing she had been desperately trying to ignore. That was the last time she would let Zoey convince her it was a good idea to go out and spend nearly her entire Beanies check in one night at a fucking bar. Getting drunk at home was much more cost effective even if it left her feeling just as shitty. Though it was difficult to stay pissed off at the bumbling idiot in front of her. “I see you’re cheating on me, though.” Once again, his face flushed bright red. His eyes looked like they were going to pop right out of his head. Like a set of blue marbles were about to fall right out and roll across the parking lot. She smirked. “Starbucks?”

Shoulders fell again as he let a deep breath out. “I… my niece works there.” He kept stumbling over the word niece like it was a foreign word on his tongue. Like it didn’t fit the situation. “She’s actually my buddy Bill’s kid… I’ve just known her basically her whole life. I used to babysit her, and she just moved to the island so she could live with him. It’s a lot of transition and--”

“Listen, black coffee guy, I don’t need you to explain your traitorous ways to me. I could not fucking care less… about, like, fucking anything.” She gestured to her cheaply made poorly designed elf costume. “Obviously.” Her phone buzzed in her pocket. An unpleasant reminder than her break for dinner was over without her taking a single bite of food. She still had a couple containers of ramen at home that would have to do when she eventually dragged herself through her front door. She reached to the shorts beneat the skirt of her dress and pressed the volume rocker on the side of her phone to silence it. “Well, this has been sufficiently awkward, so I appreciate that.”

He scratched at the back of his neck. “I’m sorry?” he mumbled, shifting the bags again. This time a small jingling brightly colored mouse fell out, which he quickly snatched up to throw back into the bag it came from.

“Pfft, shut the fuck up,” she snorted, waving him off. He stared back at her with wide eyes, as if he were unsure of how to respond to her words. “I can say that. I’m not on the clock, and currently, black coffee guy, you’re not my fucking customer. You’re just a guy talking to a fucking elf.” The corners of his mouth quirked up into a bewildered smile while his eyes stayed sprung open. She bit back her own grin. “As much as I’d like to stay out here and freeze my ass off, Santa’s running a tight operation in there, so I have to run.” She started back toward the mall, looking over her shoulder to find him watching her still. “But you know where to find me, I guess… if you’re looking for shitty coffee or Christmas cheer. No more running into me, though. Can’t have you finding out about my underground fight club.”

“Bold of you to assume I’m not already in on it. The first rule is we don’t talk about it, right?”

She bit down on the inside of her lower lip to keep from beaming at him. It was the first time he said anything vaguely clever at her. Normally, there was nothing but awkwardness that transpired between them, but this time around, he actually had something to come back at her with. She chuckled. “See you Monday, black coffee guy?” she mused, pulling her sweater tighter around her.

The smile grew on his lips. “Oh! Yeah!” he sputtered out. There he was. Back to the bumbling dumbass who had somehow endeared himself to her in the droves of her shitty and terrible customers. “I’ll be the guy with the black coffee!”


	2. Coffee Time Confrontations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paul tutors Alice at a Starbucks in a Barnes & Noble

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M GLAD YOU GUYS ARE JAZZED ABT THIS BECAUSE SO AM I.

Paul wished he never stopped to ask her how she was in that stupid parking lot.

She had just been sitting there, looking so dejected. He wasn’t able to stop himself from asking until it was too late. When she had looked up, he immediately knew. The face was clear in his mind. It was embarrassing to admit, but he thought about her often. Not in any way that would get him any sort of dirty look. He just wondered about her. What she liked to do outside of that shitty coffee shop. What her parents were like. What her childhood was like. What sort of music she listened to. The most humiliating admission of them all was that he didn’t even know her name. This woman he saw nearly everyday, save for those she had off at Beanies. This woman that occupied his thoughts more often than he would ever tell anyone. This woman he had strangely fallen in love with, and he didn’t even know her fucking name.

His leg bounced up and down beneath the Barnes & Noble cafe table. He clicked his pen against the composite wood. Glancing over his shoulder, he tried to peer through the window and into the main center of the mall, where the holiday display was set up. Parents and children wrapped around the corner in a chaotic, disorganized line. There was no rhyme or reason to who was standing where. Kids screamed in annoyance and exhaustion after hours at the mall. All to see some underpaid drunk guy--whose name apparently was Leland--and sit on his lap. There was no way to see the actual Santa’s workshop display though. At least not from where he was sitting. That didn’t stop him from trying over and over again, though. It had been exactly a week since he had run into her in the back lot, which Alice told him to park in because it would be easier to park with staff than with the general public. He didn’t like the rule breaking, though he wasn’t opposed to the fact that he was able to park in a spot where his car wasn’t wedged between two minivans that were barely in their respective slots. 

He craned his neck to try and get a better view of the platform Santa was sitting on. To no avail, he sighed and returned to the drink in front of him. Black. Not coffee so he could finally get some fucking sleep. Far cheaper and better in quality than anything he had gotten from Beanies even if it was one of those fancier holiday drinks, but there was just something he wasn’t enjoying quite as much about it. He looked over at the crowd again. The line was getting shorter. His eyes shifted to his phone screen. Quarter after six. Maybe she would be leaving around the same time as him this time around. Maybe he would actually ask her what her name was. Maybe, and  _ just maybe, _ he could even convince her he wasn’t being creepy, as he was in fact there to be a calculus tutor, and then possibly perhaps get her phone number. God, that would have been fucking ideal.

A loud thud came from the table in front of him, startling him right out of his daydream. “Alright, Uncle Paul, here’s the deal,” Alice grumbled as she slipped her green apron over her head and pulled her ponytail out through her matching green visor. Several notebooks with stray pages sticking out from them sat stacked above her text book.  _ Calculus: Concepts & Contexts, the Third Edition. _ “I got an eighty on that quiz last week by some miracle of god, so I think you must be a wizard or something. So please do it again.”

“I don’t know about any sort of magic, but I’m glad I could help,” he replied while watching her open her textbook up to a page that nearly made his face light up. “Limits? You’re doing limits in class?” She glanced up at him with an arched brow, nodding as she sat down in the chair across from him. “I loved this section of calc when I was in school. Well, high school at least. My calculus I professor was kind of a dick to me even though I was doing really well in his--”

“God, you actually like this stuff?” she groaned, clicking the lead out of her mechanical pencil. “This is why you can be friends with my dad. You’re just as bad as he is with all this nerdy stuff.”

He raised a hand to his chest to feign offense. “Alice, I’m wounded,” he gasped, trying to hold back the smile that was creeping to his face. “I thought I was your cool uncle.”

“Paul, you stopped being the cool uncle once I finally understood what cool was,” she explained coolly. She placed a small parchment bag in front of him that had a chocolate chip croissant poking out of it before taking a bite out of her own. “Do you know how many cool calculus tutors there are out there? Maybe two and you’re definitely not one of them.” The held back smile started to waiver slightly. She sighed, chuckling. “But I still love you and am thankful as  _ fuck _ for your big brain helping me through this class. Also for keeping Dad company. Lord knows he’d just be trying to one-up my mom every single day if he didn’t have your life to distract him.”

Taking a bite out of his croissant, he furrowed his brows. “My life is just fine. Thank you very much,” he insisted. The arched brow returned while she munched away on her pastry. “What?”

“He’s just worried,” she told him, shrugging. “I mean, I am a little too. Not like he is, but you’re all by yourself in that house out in the woods. You’re just a little… sad sometimes, too. We worry that you’re lonely and won’t tell anyone.”

“First of all, I’m not lonely,” he assured her, lifting his cup to his lips. “I like my house. It’s quiet… and I’ve got Janis. And your dad. We have dinner every Wednesday night.  _ And _ you’re living in town again, so I’ve got you. I get out every Saturday night. Not lonely.”

“Yes, you, the thirty year old man, considering tutoring me, the seventeen year old girl, a night out on the town. There’s nothing sad about that at all,” she deadpanned, brushing her fingers off on the apron that was crumpled in her lap. “I’m just saying that you should  _ actually _ get out more. I know you were really down on yourself after everything went down, and I just…” Her words trailed off as she watched his eyebrows shoot up, looking somewhere behind her. He sunk down in his seat like he was hiding from someone. “What the hell are you doing?”

His eyes darted over to her and then to whatever was behind her. “Oh, me? Nothing. Just trying to get comfortable,” he laughed nervously. He tried to squish as low as he could not only to hide from the outside force that had caught his eye but also from the teenager looking at him like he had three heads. “You know me. Uncomfortable and… no… don’t do that.”

Alice turned to look at what was behind her that was making him go through so much discomfort. Not that he was one to very easily be at ease. This was just ridiculous, and he was aware of that. But he couldn’t stop himself once he started. He wished he could have just disappeared, evaporating into nothing. Especially when she turned around with the biggest shit-eating grin on her face. The kind she wore when she wanted to get her way with Bill. “Oh my god, the crabby elf?” she squealed. “ _ That’s _ the girl you’ve been telling Dad about?” He shook his head furiously despite his eyes not being able to leave the fuming flurry of green and red waiting in line at the Starbucks counter. His face felt like it was on fire. “Oh, cut the shit, Uncle Paul. You think good ol’ Bill can keep a secret to save his life? Absolutely not.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t tell your father anything for that reason in particular.” Which was true. He didn’t, but maybe word about the cute barista had slipped. Ted did like to give him a hard time due to that  _ one _ time they’d gone to Beanies together and he tripped over himself while talking to her. It was just one time, though. Bill couldn’t have possibly remembered that. “What crabby elf are you talking about anyway? We’re here for calculus. I don’t--”

“She’s cute,” Alice mused, resting her chin in her hand while watching the elf move up the line. “If I wasn’t so into Deb, I might be tempted to hit on her, but Deb is just… the best, Paul. I don’t know.” He watched a flush fall onto her caramel cheeks. A shade darker than that of the Beanies barista. Maybe he had caught his hopeless crush blushing at some point and didn’t notice it. Why was he even thinking of that? He sunk lower into his chair. Alice looked back at him. “I think you should go for it.”

“Absolutely not,” he answered firmly. Nothing would have been more mortifying than to ask out the cute barista/disgruntled elf only to be shut down. Really, he just liked seeing her. Something about just laying eyes on her made his stomach do flips. It was as though every hair on his body was standing up when she would meet his gaze. He didn’t know it was possible to have it so bad for someone he didn’t even know, yet here he was, hiding desperately in an uncomfortable Starbucks chair hoping she wouldn’t see him looking at her. “I can’t and  _ won’t _ do that.”

“Come on,” Alice groaned, slapping a hand on the table. “When was the last time you even asked someone out on a date? It was probably when you were still fucking babysitting me, Paul! You’ve got to do it. Just ask her for her number.” He felt himself trying to sink further out of view. She leaned in with a smirk on her face. “Want to know her coffee order?” Tucking his face into the collar of his shirt, he shook his head. “Dark roast black with one sugar.” He blinked at the thought that she would like black coffee too. Of all the stupid scenarios he had pictured with her, knowing her coffee order hadn’t been one of them. Now, though, it would be something he thought about on the regular. Picking up coffee on a Sunday morning and meeting her for breakfast in Oakley Park. Laughing over lukewarm breakfast sandwiches. “She comes in here every Thursday night to study, y’know.”

A wave of dread came over him. “You know how old she is?” he wondered despite his better judgment. He shouldn’t have even played into her little game, but he still had to know. She had an ageless way about her. Like she could have just left her teens but also could have been well into her thirties. Full of life yet sick of it at the same time.

Alice shrugged. “I don’t know. Old enough to know all the lyrics to that song by En Vogue that Raven did a lip sync to on  _ Drag Race _ one time. I only know the ‘never gonna get it’s honestly, but she was browsing the nonfiction section one day mouthing along to every word.” She looked at him seriously. “Clearly, she very likely lived through the nineties.”

The second he heard the words ‘En Vogue’, he had tuned Alice out completely, having enough information from just that to know he wasn’t barking up the tree of someone not much older than her. Also because he wasn't sure about anything else she had mentioned in the statement aside from a vague knowledge of  _ RuPaul's Drag Race _ he obtained between Alice and Deb giving him weekly recaps. He didn’t really understand their love for it, but he was happy to pretend to be able to keep up with their excitement.

His eyes fell onto her, watching the barista behind the counter hand her a red cup as she dropped a handful of change into the tip jar. The pounding in his chest felt like it was playing on full blast in his ears when she turned around. Hair popped out from beneath her hat in chocolate curls, a far cry from the messy updos she sported at the coffee shop. She took a slow careful sip of her hot coffee. A small smile perched itself on her lips as she pulled the cup away, satisfied with the flavor. He willed himself to look away, though he wasn't able to find the strength to. His gaze was always drawn to her without fail. He felt like some witless schoolboy spying on a crush. This was the most embarrassing thing he had done to himself in recent memory, which was saying a lot because he had the tendency to make a fool of himself daily. 

When she looked up and made eye contact with him, though, he felt like he was having that terrible dream where he was giving a speech in front of his entire grade in school in his underwear. Mortified, he shrunk into himself a little more. Alice peeked back at him with a grin before turning to wave at his elven love. Love? What was he thinking? He didn’t know this woman. An involuntary groan left him as Alice waved her over. Limits and graphs sounded like heaven on earth at that moment. She moved through the little cafe, a shit-eating grin to match Alice’s on her face. The bell at the end of her hat jingled as she walked. “Glad to see they let you have a break at this place,” she commented to Alice while taking a sip of her coffee. “Gotta say that it’s a little more burnt than usual, though. They put a pot on when you left?”

“What can I say? I work with a bunch of art school dropouts who wouldn’t know good coffee if it bit them in the ass,” Alice scoffed, breaking off another piece of her croissant to pop into her mouth. “How’re the kids today?”

She tapped her toe against the tiled floor. A ratty pair of Converse had been hidden beneath the elf shoe coverings she had been wearing in the parking lot the week before. “Well, on a scale from  _ Dennis the Menace _ to  _ the Exorcist _ , I’d give them a solid  _ Home Alone _ . Very ‘get ya paws off me, ya goddamn dirty ape,’ y’know?” she decided, bopping her head back and forth as she explained. He attempted to stifle a laugh at her scale for poorly behaved children, but failed miserably. She turned her attention right to him, smirk dangling from her lips. “You know this punk, black coffee guy?”

Before he had a chance to get a word in edgewise, Alice piped up for him. Thank god. “This is my uncle,” she answered as she jabbed a thumb back in his direction and took the crabby barista’s focus off of him. “Well, kind of uncle. It’s a long story, but he’s a huge nerd and helps me with calculus on my dinner breaks.” Maybe it wasn’t so good that she cut in for him. “So,  _ Emma, _ just the usual mid-evening shift pick up tonight?”

_ Emma. _ The name he had been too much of a big stupid chicken to ask for. Emma shook her head, a wide grin crossing her lips. “Nope, I just got off about five minutes ago, so I got myself one of those fucking peppermint mochas and you better believe I’m putting whiskey in that shit when I get home,” she said with a hint of genuine glee in her voice. He’d never witnessed her getting off a shift at work. The sheer joy in her features was enough to make his own smile light up like a Christmas tree. She looked back to him, jutting her chin out in his direction. “What about you? Just a black coffee?”

He shook his head. “Nope,” was all he was able to utter. No explanation as to what he was drinking in place of coffee. No witty quips to throw at her. The ones she seemed to be able to use on the fly with such ease that it dazzled him each and every time. No, there were no other words that would come to his mind. His head felt like it was full of static.

Emma arched a brow, ready to give him a hard time. “Uncle Paul likes the caramel apple spice on Saturday nights,” Alice chimed in, kicking him as subtly as she could under the table. He lurched up in his seat. “If he has coffee after six, he’ll be up all night, which would be shitty since he’s got nothing going on tonight.” He understood the angle Alice was going for. He really did. However, each time she said something about him, it made him look like more and more of a homebody loser who was good at math.

“Huh, no kidding,” Emma mused, taking another sip of her mocha. “I took black coffee Paul for a party animal. Guess I was wrong.” He knew she was kidding. There was nothing about him that read as anything less than a guy who liked to sit at home on a Saturday night with a cat and a book and be in bed by nine PM. The mild insomnia, though, might have come as a surprise to her, but that was a different story for a different day. Her eyes caught his like a glass of fine scotch. Warm and burning with something he couldn’t place. “Well, black coffee Paul.” He liked the way she said his name. Actually, he just liked her. His name sounded the same as it did from anyone else in its tone, but there was a little magic in her voice. Like listening to his favorite song for the first time in ages. “If you’re looking for something to do tonight, I like to go down to Johnny Mac’s later on Saturday nights. They do karaoke after ten, and  _ Zoey _ and her friends get wasted and sing a metric fuckton of bad Whitney Houston.”

Was she inviting him out? Was this an invitation? His heart felt like it was going to explode. “Okay,” he managed to spit out. “Sounds good.” Was he agreeing to go out? To a bar? With the Beanies barista? Was this a date? Did he just get asked out on a date? He kicked himself internally. She wasn’t asking him out on a date. Absolutely not.

“Alright, well, I’ll see you there then, black coffee Paul,” she chuckled, shooting a finger gun at him with her free hand before looking back at Alice. “You, though, continue doing the fucking lord’s work here, kid. May the giant spaghetti monster in the sky smile upon you and make people be not such enormous gaping assholes.” And with that, she was bounding through the Barnes & Noble with just a little extra pep in her step. One that he only got a glimpse at when she successfully told off a customer at Beanies without getting ripped a new one by her manager. 

His heart was hammering so loudly in his ears he barely heard Alice squeal once Emma was out of earshot. “Oh my  _ god, _ Paul!” she shrieked, bouncing up and down in her chair. “This is so exciting! Oh my  _ gooooddddd, _ I can’t wait to tell Deb. She’s going to shit her pants.” She looked down at her phone, and her face pinched. “Well, maybe later. I really am--”

“Alice, please don’t blow this out of--”

“Paul, come  _ on! _ You just got asked out by the hot mall elf,” she interjected with a groan as she flipped to a blank page in her notebook. 

“I did  _ not _ get asked out. It’s a thing at a bar where there’s going to be a ton of people. I don’t even like bars, and no one’s fed Janis yet.  _ And _ we wasted so much time here and--”

She smirked. “Dude, she’s into you. Shut the fuck up,” she laughed, clicking the graphite up out of her pencil once again.

He blinked. Well, that was an impossibility. “You know your dad would have a heart attack if he heard you talking like that,” he warned, peering over at the first problem she had placed a pink sticky note next to. “Besides, she absolutely is  _ not _ into me. This is a… pity thing because  _ you _ made me sound like a sad sack math nerd with no life.”

“Don’t be mad because it’s true.”

“I…” His mouth snapped shut. She wore a smug look on her face. “You were a lot nicer when we used to play video games on Saturday nights.”

“What can I say? You let me win too many times, and it went to my head,” she chirped. Her smug grin turned to a real honest smile for a moment. “This is going to be good for you, though. I mean, worst case, you get to spend a single night at a bar with a hot girl while making fun of bad drunken karaoke. Not a bad time if you ask me.”

“I just… don’t do this kind of thing,” he sighed, tapping the back of his pen along the different parts of the problem on the page. “I don’t like bars.”

“You’re hopeless, you know that? I can’t believe I set you up for a slam dunk and you’re just going to go home and--”

“I didn’t say that,” he cut in with eyebrows raised. “I  _ never _ said that.”

She beamed at him. “Uncle Paul, you fantastic recluse,” she squealed, rapping her hand excitedly against the table. “You better come in tomorrow and tell me all about it. I’m working nine to three.”

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath in, attempting to look exasperated. Even though, in reality, he was going to do exactly that no matter how it went. He pursed his lips to hide the excited smile that was bubbling up inside him. Terrified, yes, but thrilled no less.


	3. A Mariah Carey Level of Confidence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma goes to destress while watching bad karaoke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M SO STOKED THAT Y'ALL ARE ENJOYING.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading and enjoying. The comments bring me a lot of joy and I AM JUST SO HAPPY YOU GUYS ARE LIKING IT.

Emma liked getting out on a Saturday night from the hellish Lakeside Mall and having a relaxing evening of making fun of drunk college students singing terribly. It was a surprisingly effective stress relief tactic. Ideally, she wouldn’t have been at a bar in Hatchetfield at all, but if she was going to be stuck at one, Johnny Mac’s wasn’t too bad. The food was halfway decent. The booze was reasonably priced. The clientele was largely college kids from the neighboring towns, so she was less likely to come into contact with her numerous high school classmates who still lived in town. The place was as perfect as a bar in Hatchetfield could be. Plus, the titular Johnny Mac usually bartended over the weekend, and they got on pretty well.

She sat at the edge of the bar, swirling the Maker’s Mark around in the bottom of her lowball glass. There had been a lull between the last young man singing  _ Baby Got Back _ and the following performer. Singing was a generous way to put it, honestly. Screaming would have been more accurate to describe the tribute he had just paid to Sir Mix-A-Lot. She glanced down at her phone with a lingering smirk on her lips from the uncontrollable snickering she had just been partaking in. A number of notifications from her biology group chat had popped up. This particular Saturday night she had been ditched by her comrades from Principles of Biology with one Henry Hidgens. Normally, they would all go out, get a little shit faced, and be unnecessarily mean to the shitty girls who came into all the various retail outlets around town acting like assholes. 

They weren’t her friends, per se. Especially considering they were mostly at least five years younger than she was. It was the curse bestowed upon her starting at community college at the ripe age of thirty while the rest of her classmates were closer to the age they left high school at. But they were easy to get along with. As it turned out, not everyone who lived in town loved it. Some of them, in fact, hated the island just as much as she did. Being able to commiserate with people was nice. Specifically, getting to bitch and moan about Hatchetfield with other adults felt almost cathartic. She was previously branded as an angst-ridden teen for having as much resentment as she did toward her hometown. Now, though, her complaints were received with mostly agreement and would even be built upon from time to time.

Bourbon slid down her throat. Easy. Golden. Warm. Exactly what a cold night warranted. Something to warm her insides enough that she wasn’t so filled with rage anymore. Dealing with screaming children all day was less than stellar. Certainly not where she pictured herself at any point in her life. Some of the people who walked through were those she vaguely recognized. All the school spirit having cheerleaders looking like a Nordstrom wrapped Christmas gift as their numerous children ran amuck shrieking about wanting a toy or a treat. It frankly made her want to shove scissors right into her trachea just to have some sort of relief from the madness. Johnny Mac’s secret bottle of Maker’s Mark would have to do in this case, though.

The chair beside her screeched against the wood floor. She grimaced. Sitting off to the edge of the bar was really her play to be left alone all night. Someone sitting next to her was not a part of the plan. She drained the rest of the bourbon, though her initial intention was to savor it. If she was going to have to deal with some idiot middle aged man looking to hit on her, she might as well have a little extra liquid courage in her. The person sat beside her. Tall. Sitting up straight to the point she was almost uncomfortable for them. A sweet concoction of cologne with a hint of spice and mint drifted in her direction. Whoever it was cleared their throat as if to get her attention. Despite the alluring smell, she felt her face immediately turn dark and aggravated. She whipped her head in the direction of whoever had decided to sit next to her. “Listen, buddy, I’m not interested. I… ho _ ly _ shit,” her tone went from harsh to shocked. As surprised as the face staring down at her. Black coffee Paul’s eyebrows were raised, eyes wide. “You fucking came.”

He folded his hands in front of him. They looked soft. Like they hadn’t been through much work over the course of his life. She could picture them typing away at a keyboard all day. Rifling through the television channels at night. With a closer look, though, the skin on the side of his thumb looked as though he had picked at it regularly. A nervous tic perhaps. He tapped one on top of the other. “Um… yeah, I’m sorry I’m late. I kind of lost track of time once I got home,” he blathered, eyes looking anywhere but at her. When he finally brought his gaze back to her, his face pinched with worry. “Did you not really want me to come? Because I can go. I don’t--”

She held a hand up at him. “No, it was a real invitation, dude,” she laughed. A genuine chuckle at his anxiousness. The invite had come out of her mouth before she had the chance to stop herself, but based upon the horror that covered his face back at the Starbucks, she figured he would be standing her up. Which was absolutely fine. She was going to make fun of drunk babies singing badly all night even if it was by herself. She did, however, try to ignore the fluttering in her gut when she realized who sat next to her. “I just wasn’t sure you would actually take me up on it.”

“Well,” he began with a shrug. His eyes darted around the room at the various TV screens and the girl who was stumbling up to the karaoke mic. “I couldn’t pass up the opportunity for some quality entertainment.”

A smirk crossed her lips. “And you’ve been trying to hit on me for the past eight months.” That was a very specific number. Had she been keeping track? Fuck no she hadn’t. She couldn’t even exactly name the period where she actually began to notice him, although she was sure it was there somewhere. At some point along the line, she had started to get his cup of mostly spit free black coffee ready when she watched him pop onto the back of the line. Not for any reason in particular. He was just a decent human who didn’t treat any of them like shit. Also he liked to leave her five dollar tips, which she greatly appreciated. She glanced up at him to find a blush had spread like wildfire across his cheeks. “C’mon, black coffee guy. You didn’t think I was that dense, right?”

Before he had the chance to respond, a hand reached out to grab her empty glass she had just placed on the counter. “Another round?” a voice gravelly and intense came from behind the bar. A set of steely eyes stared back at her. Although when she glanced up to see what was going on, she realized that perhaps her second round of bourbon shouldn’t turn into three. Johnny spun around in her vision slightly. “Another round,” he decided before turning to retrieve the bourbon.

Paul sat wide eyed, staring directly in front of him. A bewildered smile crossed his face as he gave a little nod and muttered what she thought was ‘okay.’ Another glass of bourbon materialized in front of her. The golden haired bartender stood in front of Paul, watching him expectantly. “Oh, um, could I get the Red Tape lager?” the words fell out of his mouth, and without another word, the bartender was off in the opposite direction. He looked over his shoulder to find her staring right back up at him. “What?”

She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “What’s your play here, black coffee Paul? What’s your deal?” It was a question that had been plaguing her thoughts for the past week. Since she saw him in the parking lot. Though she likely had the same query lurking in the back of her mind for the last several months, she would never actually admit that. 

He splayed his fingers out along the edge of the bar, tapping his finger tips ever so lightly along to the music that was playing while the next karaoke singer decided what she was going to sing. “I don’t know,” he answered, which sounded pretty honest to her mildly buzzed ears. “I guess my play was to drink a couple beers, listen to some bad karaoke, and find out how one finds themselves dabbling in the exotic art of mall elfery.” She let out a laugh. One louder than she had intended. To be fair, his answer was funnier than she had anticipated. The bartender returned and placed a warm amber colored beverage in front of him. “Thanks. Um.” He reached into his pocket to fish out his wallet, pulling a credit card out to hand to the serious faced man. His eyes drifted to Emma. “You want to open a tab?”

She arched an eyebrow. “You sure you’re ready to foot that bill?” she countered.

A hint of a smirk hit his lips. She bit down on the inside of her cheek, fully prepared for whatever small moment of confidence was about to hit him. “Did you drive yourself here?” Puzzled, she shook her head. Not exactly what she had been anticipating. “Plan on calling a cab?” She nodded. He turned back to Johnny. “I’m, um, going to open up a tab.”

The man nodded and took the card from Paul’s hand. Something warm swirled in the pit of her chest. Maybe the whiskey in that peppermint mocha wasn’t the best thing to pre-game with before heading out. Truthfully, she had driven down to the bar, but a part of her felt like humoring that cliche of having her drinks paid for by some sap. Not that she planned on doing that much more drinking honestly. “You didn’t have to do that, you know?” she mumbled into her glass. 

Another shrug. “I really don’t mind,” he insisted, taking a sip of his beer. His eyebrows shot up. “You like beer?” Strange and very suddenly shifting to a different topic. 

Another brighter smile found its way to her lips. She was feeling as dopey as he acted. What the fuck? She hadn’t had that much liquor yet. “I do like beer,” she chuckled with another nod.

He pointed to the glass in his hand. “ _ This _ is a really nice beer,” he told her, voice growing in volume as one of the microphones gave off a loud screech of feedback. “Have you tried it?”

Her hand moved out without thinking to grab the glass right out of his hand. She kept her eyes on him as she took a sip of the beer, which admittedly was delicious. His eyes were still wide. Jaw hung a little slack. Hand stayed right in position. She placed the glass back in his grasp. “Now, I have,” she announced, running her tongue along the back of her teeth. She gave a nod of approval. “Maybe I’ll have one of those next.” He looked like he was about to respond when the tinkering of opening notes to a song played over the speakers. She took her turn to go wide eyed. “Oh my god.”

He closed his eyes and gave a heavy sigh. “Oh  _ my  _ god,” he repeated, knowing exactly what was coming next. A woman she kind of recognized as being one of Zoey’s buddies stood with a glass of red liquid in one hand and a microphone in the other. The first lines of Mariah Carey’s  _ All I Want For Christmas Is You _ had never sounded louder and less in key. And she would know, having to listen to bad renditions of it all day as people sang to themselves both at the mall and Beanies. She had to give credit where credit was due, though. This girl was up there owning her shit like she was Mariah Carey herself. Riffing the wrong notes. Waving her drink around in the air. Her friends hooted as she scraped through a high note. He leaned down closer to Emma. She sucked a quick breath in, suddenly nervous. “How do you do this every week?”

She exhaled. “I don’t know. I’m not allowed to be mean to the kids at the mall, and they could fire me at any moment. I’ve got to let it out somewhere,” she explained, shifting in her seat. “Nora won’t fire me at Beanies because I am the  _ only _ person in the entire place who speaks a fucking lick of Spanish, but the mall doesn’t give a shit. They’ll just hire some seventeen year old who won’t talk back.”

“At least you’ve got job security somewhere,” he said, wincing at the singing once more. “Why doesn’t anyone tell her? Those are the worst friends ever.” She laughed over the sound of terrible singing, tossing her head back. He wasn’t wrong, but it was still silly to say out loud. Like he had been sheltered enough that he didn’t have people setting him up for their own entertainment. Maybe she just had a habit of picking up less than stellar friends. “What?” She continued with her giggles, meeting his eyes. He tossed his hands out, palms up, in front of him and accidentally slapped the upper arm of the man beside him, who whipped around to glare at him. The hands moved to raise defensively. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t…” The man turned back around, grumbling to himself. “I… um… okay?”

Gripping onto his shoulder, she continued cracking up. He stiffened beneath her touch. Between her laughter, she looked up at him to find a beet red face. Unsure of whether accidentally slapping the man next to him or her hand on his shoulder were causing the reaction, she released his shoulder and shoved his arm instead. “C’mon, Paul. Lighten up,” she chortled. “Have another beer and chill the fuck out because the next girl...” She leaned in toward him to point out the person she was speaking about. He met her half way, stooping down to her level to be closer to her and follow along better. His hand rested on the back of her chair as he did so. Her heart leapt into her throat. She swallowed hard. “She’s going to sing the worst fucking rendition of  _ I Will Always Love You _ that you’ve ever fucking heard.”

He might have responded, but she couldn’t hear him over the music that had just been turned up to the point where she wouldn’t hear anything unless someone was right next to her screaming. Whatever the response was, a smile was left on his face. Lingering and glowing in the dim light of the bar. He took another sip of his beer without taking his gaze off of the person making a fool of herself on stage. His hand stayed on the back of her chair as he leaned back down. “You’ve got really weird coping mechanisms,” he shouted so she could hear. Her grin grew to match his. Though the evening would likely just be that, a fun one off kind of night that she would remember fondly, she was very oddly content to sit there, cackling at drunk karaoke, ever so slightly taking in the warmth of his body that had gotten surprisingly close to her own.

At the very least, he was a good distraction from the heavy sadness that would forever hang over the Christmas season for her. Even if it was just for one stupid night at a stupid bar with a big stupid nerd.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also! If you have any interest, you can find me sometimes rambling abt Paulkins and sometimes other stuff on tumblr @ nocoffeeforoldmen.tumblr.com :D


	4. Negotiating the Terms of One's Murder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paul ends up being Emma's Uber from the bar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't have much of value to put here. I'm just very happy you guys are enjoying! :')
> 
> Also I hope everyone is staying safe and wearing their god dang masks!! <3

“You know what’s probably cheaper than an Uber? You driving me home!”

That was what started the drive down Hatchetfield’s unusually quiet downtown. Well, perhaps it wasn’t that unusual for December. Also it being nearly two o’clock in the morning must have added to the vacant sidewalks illuminated by streetlights lined with Christmas lights. The air had been dry and cold when they left the bar. Puffs of their own breaths surrounded them like a booze scented cloud. They had stayed right up until the titular Johnny Mac kicked them and the other few remaining patrons out. It had been a lot of laughter at the stupidity going on around them whilst sipping on various beers and eventually splitting a plate of french fries. All in all, honestly, better than either one of them could have imagined. 

Paul glanced at Emma in his passenger seat. She leaned forward and drummed her fingers lightly on the dashboard while humming along quietly to _Seven Nation Army._ Her eyes gazed through the front windshield almost as if she were sober enough to be keeping an eye on the road. She looked over at him, and his own eyes darted away as quickly as possible with the hope that she was drunk enough to not catch him looking. The little chuckle that laced her humming, though, indicated that she was not, in fact, inebriated enough to not catch him looking like an idiot. His heart raced in his chest. There wasn’t any set thing that he anticipated coming out of the night, but he certainly didn’t expect to be driving her home. 

The humming very abruptly stopped as he rolled up to a red light. Flurries flecked on the windshield. He couldn’t recall if there was snow in the forecast when he last looked. Though, to be fair, he didn’t check very often. His eyes drifted over to her once more to find her frantically jamming her hands into the pockets of her jeans, pulling out her phone, wallet, and chapstick. “Fuck,” she muttered, lifting herself out of her seat just slightly to peek at the seat below her. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity fuck.”

Checking to make sure no one had rolled up behind him, he shifted the car into park and threw his hazards on. “Everything okay?” he asked, feeling the panic rising in his gut. She continued to curse to herself. Her hand smacked above her, looking to turn on one of the overhead lights. Their fingers grazed when he moved in to press one of them on. His gut churned with an unprecedented excitement. She looked at him for a moment before continuing on her tirade on the seat below her. Hands moved wildly along the fabric like she was looking for something that clearly wasn’t there. “Emma?”

Huffing, she brought her attention back over to him. “Paul,” she said seriously. Her cheeks were flushed like they were the week before in the chilly air of the parking lot the week before. “I think I left my keys at the bar.” She brought her hands up to the sides of her head. “Holy fuck, what the fuck am I doing?” She looked at him with wide eyes. “I’m fucking drunk in the car with some dude I barely know, and now, I can’t find my keys. This is _exactly_ the start of a shitty episode of _Law & Order _. God! What the fuck?”

His fingers tightened around the steering wheel. He was suddenly regretting not savoring moments before when she was jamming along to the music playing off of one of the CDs she immediately gave him shit for having in his car when she got in. The various touches on his arm that almost came off as being second nature as she laughed at her own jokes. The joy he felt in his own heart just getting to hang out with her a little bit. Like he didn’t want to let go. Like he could have let the night go on forever and ever. 

She dropped her hands from her head. They fell with a slap against her thighs as she let out a sigh. “You know what? Fuck it,” she muttered. Her lips pressed into a line while she looked up at him. “Never cared much about kicking the fucking bucket early. Why should tonight be any different, huh?” Did she think he was going to get them killed somehow? “Wanna go back to your place?”

Even though she had leaned back in her seat, she didn’t look as casual as she wanted to seem. There was something uptight and almost anxious radiating off of her. His eyebrows shot up. “What?” he spat out. _That_ certainly wasn’t on his mind as an option to happen that evening. Not that there was anything to hide at his house or that he didn’t want her there. He blinked. “Wait do you think _I’m_ going to murder you?” She turned to him with a single arched brow. “Oh my god, no! I wouldn’t… I’m not going to… Emma!”

She snorted. “You’re right,” she mumbled, slouching against the seat. “You’re too much of a bumbling mess tonight to have any kinda homicide on the brain.” She raised a hand and closed her eyes to rethink her statement. “A cute bumbling mess but fucking still.”

Without a second to think about getting his filter up, he responded with a bewildered, “You think I’m cute?” The moment the sentence left his mouth he wanted to kick himself, yet there he was, snapping his mouth shut while she bit back laughter at him. Maybe she was joking? Trying to take the piss out of him just one last time for the night.

“God, you’re a fucking nerd,” she scoffed while she turned her eyes out the window. When they didn’t begin moving from the intersection, she glanced at him over her shoulder. “But yeah, kinda. I guess. You’ve got these… eyes. I dunno.” He brought one shaking hand to the gearshift, trying to hide the smile on his face. The flurries were blowing around steadily, looking like they were becoming more solid flakes. He peered over at her again. She rested her chin in her hand as she stared out the window, tapping her index finger against her chin to the beat of _Basket Case._ “I could try to call a friend if you don’t--”

“No!” he interjected a little more eagerly than he wanted to. She lifted her head to fully face him. He cleared his throat. “No, I have a guest room and… it’s okay. I could… um… drive you back tomorrow to grab your keys and car tomorrow.” The car finally started to roll through the intersection, where he hung a quick right to double back in the opposite direction. “And… I’m not going to murder you. I promise.”

“Pfft, we’ll fucking see,” she replied, sounding a bit more teasing this time around. She reached out to turn the volume up on the music like she had been in his car a million times before. In her defense, he almost felt like she had even if he hadn’t known her name until less than twelve hours earlier. Really, the whole evening felt a little like there was some sort of dejavu going on. Like he had been in that position before even though he knew with a level of certainty he had not. Even hearing Alice purposefully annunciate her name with enough emphasis that even Emma had to know what she was doing felt as though he was being given some common knowledge. Maybe she just wore a nametag at some point at Beanies, but he was pretty sure she hadn’t.

His house was on the far side of town, tucked away in the woods away from downtown. The roads were quiet and became less well lit as they traveled further away from the bar and Beanies and CCRP. He wondered if she remembered the time Ted told her where they worked in the hopes that it would impress her and she might give into his stupid flirting. He just stood beside his workplace idiot friend, beet red and unable to say a word. She had wished him good luck while he paid for their coffees and Ted stormed out after she shot him down… again. He shook his head, trying to force the memory out of the forefront of his mind. 

Snow fell in solid flakes as he turned onto a windy backroad. He was sure he hadn’t seen snow for the next few days now that he thought about it. The weather had been playing quietly in the background while he drank his coffee and flipped through a book that morning. Nothing about snow. It could have just been a passing dusting, but he maintained vigilance just in case anything had started sticking on the roads. Occasionally, he flicked his glance at her. She clenched her already sharp jaw every time he took a curve too quickly. Her fist squeezed tightly in her lap. He resisted the urge to grab it with his own hand.

It was peaceful living off in the woods on the island. There were so many people he knew who liked to refer to it as a “tiny town”, but Hatchetfield really boiled down to be more of a small city. A mall. Two high schools. An entire downtown district. Districts in general. Numerous parks. This was no small town. Sure, it was a city that held a lot of generational residents who had a very small town mentality. Still not a small town. “I didn’t even know anyone actually lived back this way,” she mumbled, more to herself than anything else. He had to agree, which he did with a quiet hum. When he first moved into the house, he had been surprised that there was even more than one remote house back where he was. Looking back on it, he should have known. He may not have known the area too well, but he was well aware of the homes that backed onto the quiet waters of Chestnut Pond, which in and of itself was more of a tiny lake.

The driveway was long and winding like most of the roads they had just traveled on, though it wasn’t paved like the road. Just a long trail of gravel. She squirmed in her seat slightly. He wasn’t entirely sure if it was nervousness or excitement he was feeling off of her. The latter was what he assumed it actually was, but he was hoping the former might at least be part of it. She dipped her head down as if to get a better view of the house as they approached. “Holy fuck,” she whispered. “Are you loaded, black coffee Paul?”

He put the car into park. “What? No,” he responded, joining her in looking up at the house. He could see where it might have looked that way. It was a sizable house. Three bedrooms. Two and a half baths. Expansive front porch. In the daylight, he liked it better. It almost seemed smaller and more manageable for one person. Red with white shutters. Looking more like a repurposed barn than anything else. “It was actually pretty cheap for what it is. A lot of TLC had to be put into it. It… uh, went into foreclosure. Something about a nasty divorce, I think.”

A quiet hum came from her, but her eyes didn’t leave the house. It was like she was studying it. Sizing it up maybe. Perhaps she was the one planning on murdering him. He shook the stupid thought out of his head. “Someone home?” she wondered, nodding toward the light that was shining from a room upstairs. 

“Oh, no. Just me,” he answered, pulling his key from the ignition. “It’s just… I don’t know. My cat gets weird at night. She just walks around the one room and cries unless I leave the light on. It’s bizarre.”

“So you left a light on for a cat even though you weren’t going to be there to listen to it meow all night?” she questioned, words growing a little less slurred than they had been when they had initially left the bar. 

“Well, when you say it like that…” he started, but stopped midway. He thought about the little calico face waiting on the other side of the front door. “Yeah, I did.” This time, she took her turn to look over at him, which he caught out of the corner of his eye before meeting her gaze. “What?” A soft smile touched her lips. One that he hadn’t seen. Not a shit eating grin or a forced retail smile. No, there was something more genuine in it. Maybe even a little perplexed. “ _What?”_ he repeated, feeling his own smile coming on.

“I can’t believe you have a fucking cat,” she decided on. He had a sneaking suspicion that wasn’t really what she had been thinking. Something was lingering in her head that she wasn’t willing to let out. He could feel a blush spreading like wildfire over his cheeks, but unlike all the other numerous times he had looked at her and felt all his insides flip, he couldn’t help but continue grinning at her. “You’re a fucking goon.”

“You don’t know that. You barely know me,” he challenged. “I could be a serial killer for all you know.”

Another snort left her as she unbuckled her seatbelt. “Alright, Ted Bundy, just make it quick and keep my head in the freezer as a trophy. I won’t accept anything less,” she countered while gathering up her phone, chapstick, and wallet to shove back into her pockets.

“I don’t think that’s how murder works. You don’t get to negotiate the terms of your death last time I checked.”

“Rookie mistake. There’s _always_ room to fucking barter, my guy.” She pulled open her door. “Now, let’s go deal with your crybaby cat.” He chose not to shoot back with any reply but to follow her toward the house instead. They met at the front of his car, lingering close together as they walked up the steps. He accidentally nudged her with his elbow while pulling his house key free from his key ring. Instead of getting out the apology his brain had immediately conjured, she pushed into him with her shoulder. His entire body felt warm despite the dropping temperature and the snowflakes falling on them. She stood closer to him than he expected as he pushed the key into the lock. He could hear her teeth clattering. “You have anything to drink, black coffee guy? I think I’m up for another round. You down?”

The bolt lock clicked unlock, and he held the doorknob for a moment while he considered her words. He shrugged. “I guess,” he said, pushing the door open. “It’s getting pretty late, though. I don’t know I’m going to make it too much later.”

She squeezed through the doorway with a scoff. “We’ll see about that,” she muttered as the door squealed shut behind them.


	5. The Paperboy and the Haunted House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma and Paul get into some champagne.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will reply to comments in the morning. I just couldn't stop writing this one and now it's late. It's been so much fun.

Emma found herself curled up on the end of Paul’s couch with a champagne flute filled with a makeshift mimosa margarita in her hand. They were the only suitable glassware he had for a cocktail. Hell, even she had lowball and other various glasses in her shitty apartment. Were any of them a part of a set? No. Were they all from the Target clearance section? Yes, but the point still stood. For someone who had such a nice house and a niceass bottle of champagne hiding in a very sad liquor cabinet, he really lacked the dishware one would expect. She sipped her drink and peered at him through the horizon of her very orange drink.

He turned the glass around in his hand. It was the first time he hadn’t had something nervous or stupid to say all night. The first silence that hung between them, and it wasn’t the worst. Silences usually brought the worst out in people. At least, that was what she had found over the years. Lulls in conversations stirred up old feelings. Anger and pain. It generated unrest everywhere. The very thought of it usually made her squirm, but instead, she just squinted over at him as she lowered her glass. After she pulled out the champagne and marveled at it, he had withdrawn but only after he agreed to ‘fuck it’ and just drink it with her. Since then, he had taken a sip or two since they sat down and barely had anything to add when she spoke.

“You’re real quiet,” she commented, leaning back against the arm of the couch. His living room was spacious, open with a set of end tables and a coffee table all made of the same cherry colored wood. The couch and armchair were a deep slate grey. She nearly melted into her seat when she plopped down, having anticipated the couch to feel less than stellar as far as comfort went. He glanced up from the glass to her with raised eyebrows. “It’s weird.” Her face screwed up to demonstrate her feelings on the matter. “You could have just taken me to a friend’s house if you didn’t--”

“No!” he cut in with one hand up to give her a physical signal to stop. “No, it’s okay. It’s… not that.” He looked back down at his glass. His eyes read strangely. She was used to nervous and embarrassed. She even got to witness a little bit of giddiness glittering in his eyes that night, but this was different. There was a glaze of something wistful and maybe a little melancholic in his gaze. A heavy sigh left him before he took a sip of his drink and lifted his eyes to meet hers again. “It’s just been… um... a  _ weird _ couple years for me.”

A snort came from her. “Join the club,” she scoffed. “I never thought I’d end up back in this fuckin town, but here I am!” Her vision felt a little fuzzy again. Like it had when they left the bar earlier. He looked like some kind of angel in her drunk goggles. Soft features. Those stupid fucking doe eyes. There was a kindness that seemed to radiate off of him that she wasn’t used to. Like he would be gentle with her, though she wasn’t entirely sure what that would entail.

“Here you are,” he agreed. A soft smile touched his lips, which she had found herself looking at more and more the drunker she got. All she kept thinking was how they were almost pillowy. Plush and soft, despite hers and everyone else’s being chapped as  _ fuck _ from the cold. Too bad black coffee guy was far too polite to rail her on the first date. A date? What the hell was she thinking? This was just hanging out with black coffee Paul. Nothing more. Just a night out and then a friend letting her crash there until the morning. “You from around here?”

And just like that, she realized that she wasn’t entirely sure what was going on there. They didn’t know each other at all, yet here they were at nearly three AM drinking a monstrous concoction of orange and lime juice mixed with champagne and tequila. She didn’t know anything about him, and the same went for him with her. She blinked. “Um, yeah, I actually grew up here on the island,” she answered, placing her glass onto the end table before she took the clip that held her hair up out. Curls were set free as she leaned back, looking up at the ceiling. “Down over by the old Mayberry house. Y’know the one that’s haunted as fuckin shit.”

His face pinched. It was the first she had seen him return to the person she had been at the bar since they got to his house. “You don’t really believe that, do you?” he asked. She tilted her head to the side. He knew the Mayberry house. It laid abandoned for years. The last time she had passed by, it was still empty. Something awful had happened. As a kid, no one would tell her, but she could clearly recall the numerous police cars and ambulances that carted off long black bags on stretchers. There was no way to get the full scoop on what happened. She couldn’t find any information on the incident no matter how hard she looked, and her sister, having been friends with Lisa Mayberry, wouldn’t speak a word about it. It was an old town legend at this point. Newcomers didn’t know about it. Even if they had heard anything cursory about it, they never questioned it. “In, like ghosts?”

“Fuck yeah, I do,” she replied. “That placed turned over so many fuckin times in th’fuckin nineties, and people  _ died _ there. I’m sure of it.” She pointed at him with narrowed eyes, taking a hefty gulp of alcohol. This was more the speed she had been looking for. Lighthearted (ish) conversation. Something to maybe dissolve into laughs. Really, she just wanted to have a nice light night with the black coffee guy. Not sit around with a mopey weirdo. “I don’t have--”

“Oh, people one hundred percent died,” he said matter of factly. She stopped mid sentence to stare at him with her own set of wide eyes. He nodded through another swig of his drink. “I used to do a paper route through there around that time. They questioned me about it. I  _ think _ it was Luke.” Lisa’s little brother. Emma remembered riding bikes around the neighborhood with the Mayberrys and Jane when she was young. “Went off the deep end and ended up killing all of them, but they wanted to know if I knew anything. I mean, I didn’t. I was just the paperboy, but it was still kind of cool. I felt important.”

She furrowed her brows. “You mean to tell me you were the fucking paperboy?” she wondered, running her free hand through her hair. Of all the things she could have taken away from his story, it was the bit about the paper route. “You were the kid I grew up resenting ‘cause my dad seemed to fuckin like you better than he liked me.” His face flushed red. She waved him off. “I don’t give a fuck. He just talked about how you were, like, out there e’vry morning like fuckin clockwork.”

A lightbulb went off in his head. Features brightened. “Your dad was the air traffic controller guy?” he gasped, receiving a nod of confirmation. A smile of her own touched her lips as he seemed to go through a rolodex of people in his mind, scanning the ceiling as if it were going to give him some sort of answer. He snapped and pointed at her. “Mr. Perkins. Was your dad--”

“Mike,” she corrected, pursing her lips. “Mike Perkins, air traffic controller extraordinaire. Worked all night and slept all the way through my childhood.” Paul’s face fell. “Oh, don’t give me that. We’ve all got fuckin childhood trauma, and he’s really, like, the  _ least _ of my childhood related issues, man.”

He considered her words before deciding on, “How’s he doing?” It was a cautious question. As if he wasn’t sure he was okay to ask such a thing. She appreciated his hesitation, but simply shrugged. “Oh,” he mumbled, running a finger along the condensation on the outside of his glass. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. That was dumb.”

With raised brows, she nodded while finishing off her drink. “A little, but I’ll forgive it this once.” She bit down on the inside of her cheek to stop the grin that was bubbling up upon hearing him chuckle. “He’s… um…” She placed her glass onto the coffee table. “He died last year.” A beat of silence passed between them. It wasn’t something she thought about often. Mostly because at the time of his death, it wasn’t like they were talking anyway. It was almost like he wasn’t dead at all. Just radio silent. “Mom too. A couple months later.”

“Oh, Emma… I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I shouldn’t--”

“What can ya do?” she sighed, suddenly feeling defeated. Like that grin was stuck in her throat now choking her. Heavy like lead. “They always liked my sister more--Jane.  _ She  _ was th’good one. Straight A’s. Neat to a fault. Organized. She had her whole life planned out for herself by th’time she was fuckin… twelve. A whole goddamn ten year plan as a child in this stupid… Lisa Frank binder. Y’know with all the colors and shit?” He nodded with a soft exhaled laugh. His eyes were trained on her. Very clearly intently listening to her story. It was an act that she wasn’t used to. Someone centering all their attention on her because they wanted to. Her stomach churned with a sudden warmth. “Then  _ I _ ran off. Went backpacking for like ten years after I dropped out of college. Dropped ev’rything and went to Central America--Guatemala mostly--but she still invited me to everything. Baby showers, graduations, birthdays, weddings. You name it, and I bet I was fuckin invited. But I was having th’time of m’fuckin life. I didn’t have time t’go to a dumb party, so it was a lot of ‘catch ya at th’next one’ that went on.”

Her breath hitched in her throat. The realization that was she was about to tell a virtual stranger something she hadn’t talked about with anyone not directly involved in the event’s aftermath. “ _ Then _ I got a call from my brother-in-law with the invite to her funeral two years ago, and it was like ‘shit, there isn’t gonna be a next time’.” This was what silences brought up. It was like a salad dressing left to sit in the fridge for a while. Everything started to separate and break free from her tidy compartmentalizing. “So, I came home and decided I was gonna do something t’make my big sister proud. Enrolled in community college. I’m… um… studying… the science about plants and shit.”

“Botany?” he offered.

“Yes, botany. Thank you.” She shot a finger gun at him, noticing in that moment she had stopped looking at him. Her eyes had drifted to the couch between them. The self hatred was coming out to play. The deep regret for being gone so long. Missing Jane’s wedding. The birth of her son. Ten entire years. A whole fucking decade gone to do fuck all. “I’m studying  _ botany _ and working two jobs to cover my rent and school all while trying to connect with my nephew, which is hard ‘cause my brother-in-law hates my guts. Which is also fair. I was gone for a long time, but here I am now.” She finally looked up at him. Eyes stared at her with some mix of pity and a desperation to reach out to her. “Here I am hanging out with some fuckin dude I kept running into on this fuckin island wasteland. Drunk off shitty bar bourbon and some niceass champagne.” She pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around her shins. “Sorry ‘bout that. I’m a lil drunk, and I’ve been a sad fuckin drunk these days.”

He pulled his legs up to sit cross legged. He wore socks with tiny reindeer on them. She smiled softly at the detail. “That’s okay,” he assured her before he downed the rest of his drink. “I got dumped two weeks before I was supposed to get married a couple years back if that makes you feel any better.”

She raised her eyebrows. “No shit?” she said with a sideways grin.

“Yes shit,” he reiterated, placing his glass on the table beside hers. He balled the hand into a fist, which he tapped against his one knee. His lips pressed into a hard line for a moment. “Yeah, I somehow got my college girlfriend to move back here with me. I thought this place was the best ever, and she would love it as much as I did. We both had steady jobs and a decent sized apartment. Things were… normal, I guess? My parents liked her, and we were making the moves everyone wanted us to. So I dropped three grand on a ring--”

She threw her head back, laughing, and then snapped back up to look at him. “Paul, no,” she groaned. “You didn’t.”

“Paul, yes, I absolutely did.” Another roar of laughter erupted from her. “We had the whole… everything planned. Venue. Cake. Dresses. Tuxes. Caterer. The whole thing. Then she wanted a house, so we got a house.” He gestured around them. “But  _ this _ one was my choice, which I think was the beginning of the end. She really… kinda hated this place, but I pushed for it. And I don’t push for  _ anything _ . I just  _ really _ love this place. Did from the very beginning.”

“It’s a nice house,” she agreed, resting her chin on her knees. “I like it.”

“ _ Thank _ you!” He was fun to watch talk. There was a lot of movement when he spoke. Almost like he was giving some sort of performance or acting as a very shitty sign language interpreter. Either way, she found herself entranced in his own pity party story. “She hated it and bitched and moaned the whole time about it and then…” His voice trailed off. A hand fell to his leg, where he tapped his index finger against his jeans. “One day she asked me if I loved her, and I told her I did. Then she asked if I was happy, and I didn’t know how to answer.”

“Were you?” she questioned.

“The thing is, I really wasn’t, but I didn’t realize that at the time. So I, like an absolute moron, said I didn’t know.” She must have physically cringed because he nodded in response to whatever she did. “Oh yeah, it was bad. She blew up about how everything started falling apart at some point, and get this, she blamed the fucking house. Like, a building could cause a person to pull away from someone they loved. Stupid. But that’s what she thought. Then I refused to fight with her because it was a stupid argument, which didn’t make things any better.”

“Sounds like you really couldn’t avoid sticking your foot right into your mouth here.”

“I guess. I didn’t feel bad until she started crying and talking about how she was so unhappy. How she felt like she was trying to be someone she wasn’t to appease me, which made no sense. I don’t know. By the end of the night, the wedding was off, and she was off to stay at a hotel. Not until she told me I never loved her when I asked her to stay.” He shrugged with a heavy sigh. Like the wind was leaving his sails. “I don’t know what I did. Whatever it was, I didn’t mean to do it.”

“Did you love her?” she wondered, sitting up a little straighter. 

He looked over to her like an embarrassed child. “I really don’t know,” he admitted. “I thought I did, but I don’t know.” He paused to think for a moment. “I don’t think so.” The quiet returned to wrap them up in a tense blanket. Two strangers had just divulged some of the things that weighed heaviest on their shoulders. Effectively, they were no longer strangers. Just two quietly sad people sitting in silence in a house that seemed a little empty for just one person. She debated reaching out to grab his hand that was nervously tapping away at his knee. A bit of frenetic energy being released from the emotions obviously rolling around in his head. “The worst part was I was out three grand because I proposed on fucking Christmas, so she argued it was a gift and won. Also that champagne was like two hundred fucking dollars. We were going to drink it at our wedding.”

“Man, we’re really batting a thousand here t’night,” she commented, stretching her legs out in front of her. Her feet made contact with his legs. Neither one of them moved. “Listen, man, shit happens. Sometimes we’re shitty and we don’t even know.  _ Sometimes _ people think things are shitty when really things just aren’t right for them. People are weird as fuck.” She leaned forward like she was going to tell him a secret. “But for th’record, if she comes back t’town and you wanna have me beat her up, I would totally beat the shit outta her for you and then steal three grand from her bank account.”

“Jesus,” he chuckled, the smile returning to his face. “You’re something else, you know that?”

An idea hit her, and instead of answering him, she popped up as best she could. “Hang on,” she requested, patting his shoulder as she raced out of the living room and into the kitchen. The tile and hardwood were cold beneath her socked feet, and even though this place was all new, she felt as though she had made the trip she had just made to grab the bottle of champagne from the kitchen counter dozens of times. She scooted back into the living room and carefully emptied more champagne into the flutes before gingerly setting the bottle down on the table. At least, she hoped her actions were as graceful as she intended. It was hard to tell if they really were. She handed him his glass or what she assumed was his glass. “To a couple of sad sacks a’ shit getting your fuckin money’s worth outta this goddamn champagne.”

His eyes ran over her face. The same fond look he wore at Beanies was just amplified. Like he was coming home after a long day at work. A little relieved but filled with a sense of happiness. “I could drink to that,” he agreed, gently knocking his glass against hers. The liquid slid down her throat easily, bubbles tickling her nose briefly. Sweet and full. She caught his eye as he brought his glass down and smiled. “I can’t believe you believe in ghosts, though. That’s a dealbreaker.”

“Okay, first, ghosts are so fuckin real. You’ve never been t’the Mayberry house, huh? We’re gonna have to go, and you’ll fuckin see,” she ranted before draining the rest of the champagne from the glass. “Also what deal are you talking about, black coffee guy? I don’t remember making a deal with you.”

“Keeping your head in the freezer as a trophy. This wasn’t that long ago, and I don’t think you’re that drunk, you disgruntled mall elf.” 

She tossed her head back in laughter again. “Fuck!” she hollered. When she looked back down at him, she wore an open mouthed smile. “You’re  _ way _ more fun than I thought you’d be. Even if you are a lil bit of a sad sack a’ shit, but that’s okay because same.”

He squinted at her, still wearing his grin. “Thank you… I think?” he responded, unsure of the nature of her comment. It was all good. She wanted to tell him, but the louder part of her held it back.

She patted his knee. “You are  _ so _ welcome,” she mused. “Maybe it’s just me though, and I just bring out the best in you.”

Shaking his head, he took another swig of champagne. “Maybe that’s it.” When she sat down from retrieving the champagne, she had placed herself much closer to him. Almost to the point where their knees were touching. He was warm and comfortable. She didn’t mind being so close to him. In fact, it felt nice. Maybe it was all the champagne. Probably, but she intended to continue enjoying this night that just didn’t seem to end.


	6. Post Peer Pressure Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paul and Emma have a discussion about the previous night's happenings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELL YEAH CHRISTMAS IN OCTOBER. Although, maybe I do a follow up one shot for this bad boy that's Halloween centric. Who knows?

Paul's neck had the worst crick in it that he'd ever felt in his almost thirty-one years. Also one of the worst headaches, but those he could deal with. His neck, however, made his entire upper body feel like it was going to fall apart at any given moment. He squeezed his eyes shut tighter than they already were, and when he opened them, he was greeted by a painful, albeit pretty dim, light pouring in from the sliding glass doors. An involuntary groan left him. Everything hurt, and he was pretty sure he might have been dying. 

He glanced at the coffee table in front of him. The glasses and an empty bottle of champagne from the night before still sat there. The half consumed bottle of tequila was a little fuzzier in his mind but would also explain the headache and why he fell asleep on the couch. He scrubbed a hand over his face, lingering at his jaw. His mouth felt like it was filled with the gauze they used at the dentist. Truthfully his whole face felt like he was coming off of a bad trip to the dentist's office: full of pain and regret. He probably hadn't gotten that drunk in… well, ever. Drinking had never been his thing, and now he knew why.

The last thing he could clearly remember was Emma sliding in across the hardwood in her socks with the bottle Espolòn Blanco and a handful of limes. His eyes slid shut for a moment, taking in the night before. Last week he didn't even know her name, but he spent the entire night with her last night. He could see her smirk in his mind's eye as she gave him shit for being awkward. The way her eyes lit up when she talked about her weirdass biology class. Her laugh that reminded him of the wind chimes he used to hear during summer storms at his grandmother's house. A smile filled with disbelief crossed his face for just a moment before his eyes snapped open.

Standing suddenly was a bigger mistake than all the drinking. His head felt like it was filled with pool balls. Tongue tasted like battery acid. He swayed slightly when he stood as his pounding headache protested. He made a mental note to dump the rest of the tequila later. "Emma?" he called out, his voice coming out far softer than he intended. The pool balls jostled around in his skull. Maybe she left. Got up earlier than him, called a friend, and split before he even came to whatever shitty level of wakefulness he had come to.

Stumbling toward the doorway toward the kitchen, he felt a level of panic rise in his gut. Why was he even worried? It wasn't even like they were anything more than maybe acquaintances at most. Why was he freaking out about her leaving? There was no good reason. He heard Janis meow from somewhere in the kitchen. Of course Emma left. Janis was wary of strangers. Often, she could be found hiding under his bed when anyone who wasn't Bill or Alice came around. It was odd. He adopted her, and from the jump, she was social to a fault. If someone found her wandering around outside, she could have easily been scooped up and taken, never to be seen again. As the years went by, she grew agitated with people. Like they got on her nerves. By the time he was about to be in the house by himself, he was the only person she would willingly be around.

However, the sight in the kitchen was one he wasn't expecting and could barely decipher with his hungover brain. Emma sat on the island, facing the sink, legs dangling out of his view. She wore a sweatshirt that was oddly familiar. Black with a large yellow '12' on the back. 'CCRP' barely poked out below the hood. Beside her, Janis was perched on the countertop, mewing up at Emma while rubbing her little nose against her arm. "Look at that. You gave us away," Emma groaned down at Janis, using one hand to gesture over to him. Her eyes dragged up to him. He was pretty sure it was just the hangover, but the look sent a shiver down his spine. "I was waiting to see if he'd just start playing Marco Polo to try and find us." A sideways grin grew across her face, which in the morning light looked fucking exhausted. “You look like shit, big guy. Rough night?”

He grunted something in response, which he immediately regretted. A mug raised to her lips in her other hand, hiding the smirk that was perched upon them. He didn’t understand how she could be so okay. “You made coffee?” he asked as he slid into the kitchen. Despite feeling like an on fire garbage can, he couldn’t help but fall into a weird sense of comfort with the scene unfolding before him. Emma and Janis talking shit while he grumbled about anything really before having his morning coffee. His stomach lurched, but that very well could have been the previous night’s tequila protesting his movement. 

Humming into the rim of her mug, she brought her other hand up to hold onto it. The sleeve of his sweatshirt fell well over her hand. “Yep,” she replied, voice sounding a little more gravelly now that he was up close. “Even though you have shitty Starbucks beans, I made it work.” He snorted while reaching up into the cabinet above the coffee maker to grab one of his many mugs of the same style just in different colors. She hummed once morse as she took a huge gulp of coffee. “Oh, and your mug collection fucking _sucks,_ dude. Like, this is the most white bread boring shit I’ve ever seen.”

The coffee poured easily into his green mug. A comforting pool of dark liquid. His reflection could just barely be seen for a split second. He really did look like shit. Taking a long savoring sip, he turned to face her as he leaned against the counter. “You mean to tell me you come into my house, drink my alcohol, help yourself to my clothes, and then insult me _and_ my coffee,” he muttered against the lip of his mug. He glanced up at her, feeling his eyes protest having slept in his contacts. The smile that was still on her face almost made the dry pain in his head worth it. “What?”

She shrugged. “I just think that’s a funny attitude for someone who so willingly brought me over last night,” she challenged while running a hand over Janis’s head. “At the same time, I guess that makes sense since you outright refused to kiss me last night.” He nearly choked on the coffee he was sipping. Her head was tossed back as she laughed. “Yeah, oh man. You kept going on about ‘wanting it to be right’ or some shit. Whatever the fuck _that_ means.”

Coughing, he banged a fist against his chest with the hope of dislodging the coffee that went down the wrong pipe. “I’m sorry. What?” he choked out. His heart felt like it was beating a million miles a minute. A fucking kiss? Granted, he was momentarily worried he might have done something he was going to regret in the morning and hadn’t. To be fair, though, this could have been interpreted as something of an intense regret of his. His brows furrowed. “Wait. _You_ tried to kiss me?”

A nod. “Oh yeah, it was like four AM or something like that, and I figured why the fuck not?” The thought of it being more of a passing thought made his heart sink. Like it was just something she might as well have done because she was there. It must have manifested on his face because she chuckled and leaned toward him just slightly. The grin had melted into something less shit eating and more comforting. “Oh, don’t turn into a sad sack on me now, black coffee guy. I will say the cute sad puppy dog thing is working, though.”

The hammering in his chest began again. His eyes went wide. “You’re not still drunk, right?” he spat out. She had called him cute at one point that he could remember, but she had a number of drinks in her already. The shit eating grin returned while she shook her head. “So that’s for real?”

“Oh my _god,”_ she hollered, a laugh lacing her voice. “Paul, come on.” Their eyes caught. A blush spread like wildfire up his neck, over his ears, and across his face. Normally, he was able to duck out of Beanies when this would happen, but he was in his own home now. _She_ was in his home. He watched her bite down on the inside of her cheek. Something she had done a number of times the night before as he spoke. “Jesus, I am _hauntingly_ sober. Have been since I threw up nothing but tequila and champagne right as it was getting light out.” She raised her coffee cup and winked at him. “But it’s five o’clock somewhere, right?”

“Shouldn’t we go and get your car?” he questioned. Suddenly, he was panicking. He had the _latte hottay_ in his house telling him he was cute and informing him that she tried to kiss him last night. It was like he was a dog chasing a cat that he finally cornered and now didn’t know what to do. He never really thought he’d get this far. Let alone have her actively flirting with him. Really, he wanted to take an entire bottle of Advil and eat a pound of bacon. Instead of agreeing, all she did was laugh at him. The sound was one he could listen to all day. If he didn’t feel like he had been run over by a parade of monster trucks, he might have been inclined to kiss her after the information she had just shared with him. “What?”

She jutted her chin toward the window above the sink that faced out into the woods and the side of his yard. What had looked like bare trees and dead grass the day before now looked like a winter wonderland. A sea of endless white behind a stream of white static still falling steadily from the sky. “Oh crap,” he breathed before he turned around to her again. “Emma, I’m sorry. I didn’t know this was going to happen. I--”

“I thought maybe we could do breakfast,” she suggested through another sip of coffee. The level of casual in her voice with everything she said was driving him nuts. As if they hadn’t spoken outside of the polite retail capacity for the first time a week ago. As if she didn’t just learn his name yesterday. As if he hadn’t very clearly had an unrequited crush on her for the past number of months. At least unrequited was how he had always translated it to be. He blinked. “Although, it’s a little closer to lunch, but we’re fucking adults. We could just have tequila for our meals today if we really wanted.”

“Oh god, please _no,”_ he responded without being able to stop himself. The thought of tequila or champagne sort of made him feel like crawling into a hole and dying. “Breakfast would be nice.” She beamed at him, hopping off the counter and heading toward the fridge. It was a simple movement. One that he wouldn’t have otherwise thought about, which is what got him. The action was one that was so natural. She opened up the refrigerator to browse the food he had in stock like she lived there herself. At some point between when they walked in last night and that moment, she had made herself right at home. He was pretty sure it was immediate.

She looked at him over her shoulder. “I would say it’ll cost you that kiss, but you look like the physical fucking embodiment of bad breath,” she commented with another grin. Honestly, she hadn’t stopped smiling. He wasn’t used to seeing her in such a fine mood. Crabby was the general state he knew her to be in, which was a given considering the lines of work she found herself in. It was a nice change of pace.

Moving to stand behind her, he peered over her shoulder and into the fridge. All things considered, he was pretty well stocked. He was going through a phase of wanting to try to take up cooking. There was a fair amount of fresh produce, hence the limes from the night before. Eggs were a normal staple in his fridge, but it helped that he was looking to cook a little more and had a dozen and a half at their disposal. “You really aren’t holding back, huh?” he mused. There was a ringing in his ears that made it difficult to focus, but her face peeking over her shoulder again made it easy to ignore. “Insulting me after pressuring me to drink excessive amounts of tequila. This is exactly what they told us about in school.” She pressed the fridge doors shut and turned around to face him once more with an eyebrow arched. He raised his own brows. “I was peer pressured.”

“Peer pressured my ass,” she scoffed. “If you were really peer pressured, we probably would have fucked last night, but _you_ are just like… _so_ nice I guess.” He couldn’t help but notice the genuine smile that cracked at the corners of her lips through her mocking tone. “But _no,_ you were a willing participant in the tequila. You’re just mad that I hold my liquor better than you.”

“I’m not the one who threw up tequila and champagne,” he reminded her. She pursed her lips in response. He didn’t know where this confidence in this back and forth came from, but he also wasn’t going to think about it too hard. As soon as he did, he knew it would all dissolve into the awkwardness he knew so well. “Not sure that I need to have either of those things ever again, honestly.” 

Her eyes scanned over his face. Maybe it was the cotton filling his head or perhaps he was still a little drunk, but for once her gaze didn’t make him squirm. He didn’t feel nervous about her eyes on him. In fact, he found himself looking her over as well, deciding seeing her in his sweatshirt made his heart swell in his chest. There had been so many years of another person wearing his sweatshirts, t-shirts, whatever other article of clothes, but something about her in his stupid CCRP softball league sweatshirt made him feel like he could jump over the moon, hungover and all. “I was being serious last night,” she decided on, fully leaning against the front of the fridge. “I would beat the shit out of that girl who dumped you.”

“Who? Jessica? You don’t need to do that,” he laughed uncomfortably. As much as the massive break up had left a hold somewhere in him, he couldn’t help but feel guilty about whatever broke down between them. He wasn’t unhappy not being married to Jessica, but there was a level of shame that shrouded him regarding the situation. He hadn’t been all in. Maybe she had been, and he just wasn’t because he was just following a path he thought he should have been on. “No, I think she moved back out to Utah and got married to the guy she dated in high school. And I’m… fine.”

Emma sucked in at her teeth, eyes raking up and down his crumpled second day clothing. “I don’t know about _fine,”_ she clucked. Mischief burned in the chocolate of her eyes. His heart just about stopped. “You look okay considering how much we drank last night, but I will say you look pretty fucking good in a suit.”

With that, she turned back to the fridge. His eyes felt like they could bulge right out of his head. “Where was this the last…”

“Eight months?”

“ _Eight_ months!” he repeated, hands waving in the air for emphasis. She chuckled as she pulled out the produce drawer. “Here I was thinking I was barking up the wrong tree. I should have just--”

“Stuck your tongue down my throat last night, but here we fucking are,” she muttered while shuffling around the food in front of her. He swallowed hard. “But for what it’s worth, I liked last night.” She didn’t turn around, so he tried to picture her face. A little less teasing. A little more serious. He wished he had taken her up on it now. The still drunk part of him imagined waking up in bed next to her but tried to quickly push the image out of his mind. “I think last night was… _right_. Whatever the fuck that was supposed to mean.” She decided on some green onions that looked to be on their last usable day and a block of monterey jack cheese as well as an unopened package of thick cut bacon and the carton of eggs. The doors swung shut again, and she turned to look up at him. “But yeah, if you had asked earlier, I probably would have taken you up on it.” Her eyes locked on his. Cinnamon on spearmint. A smirk quirked up at the corner of her lips. “Hey.” She shoved his shoulder with the hand holding the cheese and onions. “We’ve got all day, though, right? This shit isn’t meant to let up until tomorrow morning. You’re fucking stuck with me kid.”

He swallowed again, anxiousness rising directly into his throat. _All day._ They had all day. He glanced down and nearly immediately leaned his head back with a quiet groan. Yes, she was wearing his sweatshirt, which swam on her. But no, she was not wearing her pants from the night before.


	7. A Second Or Maybe Seventh Date

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paul takes a shower while Emma admires his yard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MAN. WE'RE ROUNDING THE CORNER ON THE END HERE, GUYS.
> 
> Also I appreciate all of your comments so much. I have so much responding, which is also what I will do in the morning because it is nearly midnight by me and work beckons me in the early morning.

When Paul’s phone screen kept flashing as he showered, Emma couldn’t help but peer over to see who exactly was blowing up his notifications. She didn’t exactly get the vibe that he was Mr. Popular with his friends, as his phone hadn’t gone off until mid afternoon. One buzz. Then two. And then a third. Peeking over her shoulder to make sure he hadn’t snuck up on her while she wasn’t looking, she pulled his phone toward her and turned the screen on. _Alice 4 Unread Messages._ She couldn’t help herself but smile at his phone background. It was a picture of the cat who had followed her around since she woke up--Janis, she had discovered--curled into a ball on the couch they ended up sleeping on the night prior.

Hesitantly, she slid her finger across the screen to unlock it on the off chance he didn’t have a passcode. Almost everyone did or utilized face recognition to unlock. To her surprise, the message thread between the young girl and him came into view. Her heart hammered against her chest. There was a level of nosiness in her that she hadn’t ever felt, but there was something about him that made her want to know more. She had a feeling, though, he might not be as forthcoming with information without the help of booze. Her eyes scanned over the messages, a smile creeping across her face.

_How’d it go last night? Any good stories to tell me when snomaggedon stops?_

_It went well. I had a nice time._

_That’s it? That’s all I get?_

_What? It was good. She’s really great._

_Are you gonna go out again?_

_Oh… I don’t know. Maybe. We haven’t really talked about that yet._

_Omfg._

_Paul._

_P A U L._

_… what?_

_SHE’S AT YOUR HOUSE ISN’T SHE?_

_What?! What made you think that?!?!_

_I never said that!!!_

_THAT ISN’T A NO_

_HOLY SHIT!!!!!!!_

_PAUL WHAT THE FUCK_

_These messages are very aggressive Alice. I feel like you’re yelling at me._

_I AM YELLING. I’M SO FUCKING EXCITED._

_WHAT DID I SAY?!?! I WAS SO RIGHT!_

_Don’t forget to invite me to the wedding. I expect to be your best man._

_YOUR BEST WING MAN. God I’m a genius._

A grin danced along her lips. What a dork. Discussing his crush with a teenage lesbian. Although, to be fair, Alice had put herself right in the middle of everything. Not that Emma was upset she did. That was what got the ball moving so quickly at the bottom of everything. She took a sip from the glass of water she had poured for herself after scouring his cabinets for a taller glass. Even after the invite Alice had propelled into motion, she really hadn’t pictured herself at his house the day after karaoke night. Well, maybe she had, but it certainly hadn’t played out like this in her head.

She had been curious about him for a few months. The way he babbled on about anything and everything at Beanies. Clearly uncomfortable and awkward. Always pink and a little sweaty. All this considered, she should have just ignored him like his mustached friend, but there was something endearing about his bumbling nature. She almost offered him her number the one evening. He had walked in looking particularly disheveled at almost seven PM. The knot of his tie was loosened from around his neck. His suit jacket from the morning was nowhere to be found, and the sleeves of his white button down were rolled up to his elbows. There was no bumbling that night. Just a couple of heavy sighs and a request for a black coffee like always.The somber attitude mixed with his normal sense of being crazy uptight was one that made her feel bad. She had almost asked him if he was okay, but instead, she held a Sharpie, hovering over the cardboard sleeve for his cup, thinking about scrawling her phone number. Instead, she just marked black coffee, handed him his cup, and let him leave in silence.

Now, she was in his house snooping through his text messages with the sweet little barista at Lakeside’s Starbucks cafe. She pushed down on the button to turn the iPhone’s screen off. Pushing off the island she had been standing over, she sauntered over to the sink to stare out into the yard. The glittering of the snow in the woods, untouched by any creature all day, almost made her understand why he would stay in this godforsaken town. A sense of peace seemed to envelope her like a warm and safe set of arms. She wasn’t going to tell him out of fear of sending him into a panicking frenzy, but he got drunk enough to let her snuggle up to him the night before. His arms had wrapped around her strong and gentle. The part of her that was going to remember in the morning hated herself for easing into his side so quickly, but the softening drunk part of her wanted to stay there forever. She took another sip of water. The snow continued down in a steady heavy stream. If given the chance, she could have spent every snowstorm going forward staring out that window. Not that she wanted anything long term or serious out of black coffee guy, but the crabby girl from Toy Zone did have a point when she said that Emma really needed to just start letting things happen. In her head, she conveniently left out the _“You’re, like, thirty and working as a mall elf. You’ve gotta want something more than that. Like, I’m gonna be an actress. There’s always something better outside of this fucking dump.”_

“Hey.” She glanced over her shoulder to find him in the doorway, hair still wet and now in one of the sweatshirts she hadn’t grabbed and a set of pajama pants. Skiing polar bears wearing Santa hats were printed all over them. He rolled up his sleeves like he did that day she almost caved and gave him her number. A blush found its way to her cheeks. What the fuck? That was his thing. Not hers. Maybe he wouldn’t notice, but the smirk that landed on his face made her think otherwise. “Anything good out there?” he wondered, jutting his chin out toward the window. 

She shrugged, desperately willing the pink from her cheeks back down to the pits of hell it ascended from. “A lot of fucking snow,” she answered simply. Why was she the nervous one now? There was no fucking need. Clearly, she could just get this guy hook, line, and sinker, yet she was standing before him with both hands clutching at her glass hoping he couldn’t tell her hands were shaking ever so slightly. To be fair, she couldn’t even convince him to kiss her last night. Figured he would be some sort of romantic, so why did that make her gut fill with a fluttering excitement. 

Socks slid across the floor to stand beside her. He was a lot taller than she was. She would have ventured to guess that he had at least a foot on her. Maybe a little more. She couldn’t be sure, but what she was positive of was how bright blue his eyes looked staring out at the bright white yard. Pressing her lips hard together, she tried to bring the foolish girly feeling in her head down and out of her mind. This was something that Jane did. This was not something she did. “Yep,” he agreed, nodding. “That’s a lot of snow.”

She nudged his side with her shoulder, causing him to look down at her curiously. “Think you’re up to a round two tonight?” He grimaced. “Oh come on. We’ll lay off the tequila and go for something like vodka instead.” He threw his head back with a groan. “Don’t give me that fucking attitude. How often do you get to bring a girl home in a snowstorm after the first date?” The words left her mouth before she had the chance to stop them. When she had initially invited him out, it was not intended to be a date. Though, she hadn’t expected to go home with either. Not that this was going home with someone in the typical sense. She didn’t even have the chance to get close to his belt. Let alone get fully into his pants. 

His eyebrows shot up. The pink on his cheeks matched her own and almost reminded her of his face as the tequila started hitting him. Flushed and happy. “Was that a date?” he sputtered. The weird level of confidence he had come downstairs with had faded away into his normal nervousness. The endearing awkwardness that really caught her eye when it all boiled down. 

With an arched brow, a smirk found its way to her face. The roles were reversing once again. She was in her power, having some sort of upper hand over him. The look in his eyes said as much. Something about her had the opportunity to just bring him down. This vulnerability that she couldn’t quite define. He hadn’t even been open about his deep dark secrets. Just enough to let her know that there was some struggle with happiness inside of him, yet he continued to smile at her. A grin tugged at the corner of her mouth. “Yeah, why not?” she conceded, placing her glass on the counter in order to wrap her arms around herself. “Kind of lame of you to not give up a single fucking kiss after the first date.”

His face pinched as he glanced back into the yard. Eyes scanned through the trees as if they were going to give him some sort of snappy comeback. She liked the give and take with him. He wasn’t as much of a pushover as she had anticipated and could keep up with her nonsense more than most people ever tried to. It was nice just sitting and talking with him. Hell, even if this whole thing didn’t pan out, she would have been happy to just get a sane friend who was her age from Hatchetfield out of it. “Does that make _this_ our second date?” he asked with narrowed eyes. 

She snorted. “Buddy, I like we skipped dates one through fucking six last night,” she informed him. The way they stood there was like they did it every single morning. Staring out into the yard. Poking and prodding at each other. She couldn’t believe she was standing there enjoying the time with black coffee guy so fully. The rapid beating of her heart made her think there was something a little more than enjoyment coming out of it. She imagined this is what Jane had felt as she got ready to go to the prom with her high school boyfriend, Tommy Baker. All giddy and stupid as she pinned her hair up and neatly lined her eyes. Nothing but smiles and giggles. God, if Jane could only see the stupid smile on her face now. She would catch so much shit.

“So date seven then?” he offered, which got a genuine laugh out of her. He had made her laugh almost all night even if there were some moments where it was unintentional. There was something really honestly cute about him. Something almost magnetic she kept finding herself drawn to everyday when he would walk into Beanies. This plain white bread boy who couldn’t muster up the nerve to ask her name for eight fucking months. In his defense, she hadn’t gotten around to ask him his either.

In a moment of weakness, she found herself leaning into him. More than just a nudge. A resting of her head on his arm. She watched him glance down at her in surprise out of the corner of her eye. “Seven sounds good,” she agreed. “Maybe we’ll _finally_ get to make out or whatever shit the kids are doing these days.” He chuckled, a little stiff under her touch, but there was still a touch of warmth in his voice. A little excitement, too. “Or fucking. I think the kids are all hooking up nowadays, right?”

“You mean to tell me it’s not all letterman’s jackets and class rings anymore?” he asked, exaggerated in his shocked tone. And just like that, she was laughing again. It was a stupid fifties cliche joke, but she laughed anyway. “How else are all the kids in our grade supposed to know I’m going steady with the prettiest girl in school?” She scoffed, shoving his arm. He grinned. “Too much?”

“No, please,” she responded, gesturing with her outside hand for him to go on. “Please continue, casanova. Woo me further. I want to see just how fucking cheesy we can get here. Leave me begging for a goddamn Lactaid.”

He pinched one eye shut as he thought of another line. She, in a way, hated how comfortable and natural this was. How much sense it made in the pit of her gut. This was some guy she barely met a week ago, yet she felt like she had known him her whole life. Maybe longer. “Okay,” he muttered, trying to get the words together in his head. “All my Christmas wishes have come true today.” She tossed her head back, grumbling at the sentiment, yet still smiling from ear to ear. “I got to have a sleepover with the cool crabby Christmas elf from the mall _and_ that stupid fucking champagne is _finally_ gone.” Janis curled around his leg with a soft meow. He looked down with a soft smile. “And my cat likes you, which is weird these days.”

“Clearly, she has great taste,” she commended, meeting his eye as he brought his attention back up. “I’m fucking awesome.” Their eyes did not leave each other like they did the past twelve hours. There was no darting off to whatever they could find that wasn’t the other’s face. It was just them. Eyes locked on one another in some strange trance. Like they were looking across time and space into some alternate dimension, where they were the only people existing in this winter storm. “Hey, Paul.”

He blinked, eyes growing wide but still refusing to move from hers. “Yeah?” he responded. His eyes were what she noticed first when she really started to take note of him. A shade of blue that reminded her of the waters in Guatemala. Of her happiest days sitting on those beaches with her toes in the sand feeling like the world could really be on her side for once. Taking in the warmth and the sun. Hatchetfield disappearing from even her most distant vision. Blue like the sky staring back at her as she laid in the tall grass at Oakley park on a cool October day. Blue like the paint that would be smeared all over her hands after a long afternoon avoiding home. Blue like the snow cones she savored at the end of the last night of the summer fair. 

Biting down on the inside of her cheek, her eyes flicked down to his lips involuntarily and then back up to his eyes. She could have fallen into the depths of the seas mapped out in his stupid fucking eyes. God, she was really fucking done for already. “I think, now that we’re both sober, it would be a prime fucking time for your ass to kiss me,” she said with less power than she had wanted. Anxiety had crept over her, which didn’t make sense logically to her. She knew there would be no reason for him to deny her this time around. He wouldn’t, right?

His eyes were wide. “Oh,” was all that came out of his mouth. And in that moment, she was sure he was going to go on again about it needing to be right, but that was the thing. There was never a correct moment. Life was always filled with uncertainty and variables. The _right_ moment would never come. It never did. “How am I supposed to kiss you with my ass?”

The question threw her off. She had fully expected him to say that he couldn’t. That they should wait. That he didn’t know if this was the time to do it. But instead, it was just him making another stupid fucking joke. She wished she could come up with something to shoot back at him, but her mind was running on fumes. The scent of mint blew onto her face with his shallow breaths. That motherfucker knew what he was doing. “Thin fucking ice, black coffee guy,” she grumbled despite the smile still poking through.

“I don’t know. It looks more like snow than ice.” A shit eating grin. One that mirrored the one she wore most of the morning and the night before. She wondered if this is what Jane felt like the day after her first date with Tom. Truthfully, she didn’t know, but some part of her was doubtful. Mostly because Paul was turning out to be way less of an asshole than Tom in the limited time she had known him. She swallowed down a chuckle. Finally, she did something better than Jane, and she had to admit her big sister would have been absolutely tickled to see her tripping all over herself for some dumb gangly nerd. 

She shook her head. “Shut the fuck up,” she mumbled, a hand reaching for the back of his neck to pull his face down to her. His lips were soft like she thought they would be. They tasted like whatever flavor of mint his toothpaste was. She didn’t really care. All thoughts of toothpaste went out the window when one of his hands found her cheek. They hadn’t seemed all that large when she had just been looking at them, but holding her there, she had never felt smaller in someone’s palm. She could feel his lips turn upward as she pushed up on her toes to be closer to his height and fall slightly when she pulled back, lowering herself to the floor. “That right enough for you, asshole?”

Once more, he could only blink at her with a bewildered smile gracing his features. He nodded. “Uh, yeah,” he managed to get out, a little breathless. What a stupid nerd. She grinned up at him. “Yep… yes. Yeah, that was… yep.”

Her hand trailed down his chest. They stood close together. Close enough to feel how warm he was. She meant for the pantless thing to be real smooth and sexy but didn’t take into account that it was fucking snowing outside and also December. His heart was pounding in his chest, clearly still the nervous nerd whose house she came to. “Hey,” she whispered, looking him right in the eye again. There was a moment of silence passing between them. Something electric and nearly palpable. Nothing Jane had ever described with her boyfriends growing up. Nothing Jane had ever mentioned in any conversation about Tom. “Do you… want to go make out super fucking hard on your couch?”

His eyebrows shot up. “Um… yeah, I could do that,” he answered in a higher pitched voice than he meant to. He cleared his throat. “Yes… um, yeah. Okay… mhm… let’s do that.”

If she hadn’t been thinking about the hand that had landed on her cheek creeping up her bare thigh and underneath the sweatshirt to discover a very similar torso, she might have been inclined to pretend she was going to hold back on him. Instead, she grabbed his wrist to drag him across the kitchen and into the living room. “Come on, nerd,” she sighed with a hint of a chuckle in her voice. “We’ve got some shit to do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ANYWAY THANKS FOR READING AND ENJOYING. I APPRECIATE YOU EVEN IF YOU DON'T LEAVE A COMMENT <3 :'D


	8. Why Call When You Could Text?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paul and Emma have some more nighttime chats.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's strange listening to Christmas music in October, but it's been a freaking joy to write this.

Paul was attempting to keep his disbelief under wraps. 

In all fairness, the technical location wasn’t a strange one for him to be in on a snowy December night. In bed. Curled up and warm underneath the blankets. Wind blowing loudly against the house in the otherwise silent night air. That was part of what he liked about his house. It was quiet and out of the way. A late winter’s night was filled with peace and comfort knowing that no one was coming around to bother him. Silent in the middle of the woods. Trapped in the snow.

What was  _ not  _ the norm was the fingertips tracing imaginary shapes across his bare chest in the dim light pouring from the lamp that was on the lowest setting in the corner of the room. Quiet chatter breaking up the creaking of the house settling for the night. The warmth of another body next to his own. That was very much something he hadn’t been used to. At least not in a long time. Sure, Janis had the habit of curling up next to him at night, but there was a pretty big difference between a tiny space heater of a cat curled up next to his butt and an actual human person wrapped around his side. Let alone, an actual human person who made his heart beat harder than it had in years.

Oh man, Ted would have absolutely shit his pants if he knew what was happening.

Paul’s fingers ran down Emma’s spine tentatively as if he were unsure about touching her. Not that he should have been nervous after the evening they had. He felt her hum against his chest. Lips brushed just barely against his skin. He tensed slightly but only to try to keep the shiver sliding down his own back a secret from her. She chuckled lightly, breath tickling its way across him. A hand trailed down from his chest and over his stomach to rest beside his own. 

He had wondered a lot about what inspired those stupid Hallmark movies. How so many people could be so attracted to an unrealistic expectation of how romance was supposed to work. Honestly, who  _ really  _ got snowed in after a first date and managed to hit fast forward on a relationship over the span over a little over twenty four hours? There had never been any sort of real ideal of love he found himself looking up to. The kind of earth shaking world changing kind of love that set the bar for what he should have been waiting for. He didn’t know much about love or any sort of romance in general, but he did know that he laughed more in a little over the day. He smiled brighter than he had in well over five years, maybe longer. He just felt… good. He felt more like himself. The fact that he suddenly felt like himself three decades into his life didn’t make too much sense to him, but she, on the other hand, did.

“You sure are quiet,” she commented. Her voice danced along his skin and seeped right into his skin. He couldn’t quite explain how the sound of her voice made him feel. It was something like being a child and hearing the ice cream truck rolling down the street. Even when she was reaming out her shitty customers, the moment she spoke a sense of joy rung in his gut. It was a happy feeling of anticipation that reminded him of waiting to blow out the candles while everyone sang happy birthday around him as a kid. Purely giddy. She moved to rest her chin on his chest and look up at him. “That bad, huh?”

His eyebrows shot up. “What?” he spat out, eyes darting down to her. She wore a smug grin and really nothing else. “No, that was… it wasn’t bad  _ at all _ . Emma, that was…” His words trailed off, and she burst into a fit of laughter. This time two days earlier he didn’t even know her name. Now, he was fairly sure he was about to fall in love with her. A strange thought to have after knowing someone for a little over a day, but it was already in the front of his mind. He was certain he could fall in love with this person. Not because it was the right thing to do. Not because it was on someone’s checklist. He closed his eyes, sighing. “Sorry. It’s been a long time since… y’know.”

She arched a brow. “Since you got laid?” she offered as a possible finish to his statement. Her fingers moved to rest over his. A quiet gesture. They laced with his own. A gentle tangling of vines sending little shockwaves all throughout his body. He always thought that electric feeling was something that didn’t actually exist. That it was fabricated by years and years of tales with pining and falling and true love’s kiss. His heart sped up in his chest at the thought: she had kissed him in his kitchen. Completely unprompted. The goddamn latte hottay.

“Yeah, since I got laid,” he agreed with a chuckle. Almost as if to test it out, he ran a thumb over the hand that was tangled with his. Her fingers were cool against his. A refreshing change from the nervous heat that had radiated off of him for over twenty four hours. He had been so anxious while simultaneously finding himself in a situation that made more sense than anything had in a long time.  _ She _ made a lot of sense in a way.To be honest, he still wasn’t sure why she invited him out. Let alone why she ended up sleeping with him. At the same time, though, sitting with her, talking and laughing, felt like riding a bike after many years. A little rusty and awkward at first, but once there was a groove, things flowed between them like people who had known each other since the beginning of time. His hand trailed down her back again, and she curled closer to him, skin pressed to skin. Her hair tickled his chest as she laid her head against it. “Can I ask you something?”

“Mhm, hit me with it,” she responded without looking up at him. If this were something that wasn’t so shocking and new, he might have been inclined to kiss the top of her head. Take in the smell of the shampoo in her curls. His shampoo, it just so happened. She had requested to use his shower, announcing that she was “ _ fucking gross” _ and needed to clean up. When she gave him a holler after getting out, claiming she couldn’t find something, he came right up. Of course, he was left frozen when she was laid out across his bed with the sheets pulled up just above her chest. Clearly, there was nothing underneath the sheet. Just as there hadn’t been when she pulled one of his hands up under the sweatshirt she had been wearing down on the couch. 

He felt frozen once again. There was this fear that kept creeping up in his mind when he started wondering how this whole thing could be real. This sort of thing didn’t happen to him. Poor sad lonely Paul was a guy who carried out a lonesome existence. Normal black coffee Paul went about his routine and that was it. He did not go out of his comfort zone. He did not go to karaoke night at a bar. He did not invite people he just met to stay over at his house. He did not get the girl. This was just the way of the world. The law of nature even. Yet there he was in his bed with an arm around her back. “So… uh, what happens when we get dug out of here?” he asked with genuine curiosity.

Did they just go back to the employee and customer relationship they had at Beanies? A polite back and forth that had the potential for something greater. He couldn’t imagine walking into the dinky coffee shop on his way into work likely on Tuesday morning and having to face her like the weekend hadn’t happened. It was a worst case scenario, but a part of him was already willing to do it if he could just see her again. He didn’t even have her, yet he was all in for her. “Well,” she began while pulling her hand free from his to drum her fingers against his stomach. “I guess you’ll bring me back to Johnny Mac’s to get my car, and then I’m never going to fucking speak to you again.”

His heart sank so low he was pretty sure he’d find it in the living room below them. That hadn’t crossed his mind, her not wanting to see him ever again. He wasn’t entirely sure why it hadn’t once she brought it up. Obviously, he had been giving himself too much credit, thinking they would just go back to how things had been before. That would never have worked. “Oh,” was all he could muster. Suddenly, he was once again regretting asking her how she was in the parking lot. He wished he could take back acting like a fucking fool with Alice and grabbing her attention from the line at Starbucks. He wanted to go back and never let her kiss him down in the kitchen.

Another fit of laughter rolled through her, confusing him further. It seemed like a vaguely douchey move to completely shut him down and then fucking  _ laugh _ about it. She propped herself up on her elbow to look at him, the palm of her hand supporting the back of her head. “I’m totally fucking with you,” she reassured him, her other hand landing against his chest. He groaned and squeezed his eyes shut. Of course she was. “Oh, don’t give me that shit.” When he opened his eyes again, his eyes caught hers, and he could have sworn there was a soft fondness she gazed over him with. A bright smile while she looked at him with even brighter eyes. “We  _ will _ have to go get my car at some point, though,  _ but _ I figured you’re going to get my number at some point. You could always text me… or call me if that’s what you’re into.”

Without thinking, he scoffed. “God, no,” he replied. He was able to throw up his filter before continuing with the thought that he would rather die than just have a casual phone conversation. Text messages were the best thing to ever happen to him. “Or if you’d rather me call you, I could do that.”

“Fuck no, dude. That’s why I said text,” she reiterated, patting his chest. She was very touchy. Whether she was laughing or just talking emphatically, she reached out to touch him frequently. Usually just taps on the arm or the occasional touch to his chest at the right angles. The panic he felt moments before with her jokingly saying she would never speak to him again was dissipating with every bit of contact they made. “What do  _ you _ want to happen, black coffee Paul?”

It was difficult for him normally to think about what he wanted. Whenever he was asked, it usually wasn’t much. Maybe more money. A partner perhaps. Nothing that he had been really driven to go out and obtain for himself. He looked over at her. An amused expression was still playing across her face, contrasting with the soft look in her eyes. He didn’t want the blizzard to ever end. This was something he could have gotten used to. “I think I’d like to go out with you again,” he answered. The smile on her face grew. “Or stay in with you again. If… um… you’d like to do either of those things.”

She dropped the smile as best she could, which was to say not very well. “I guess I could deal with that,” she responded with a shrug. He grinned at her struggle to stay nonchalant. “But I’m only coming back to hang out with your cat. Don’t get any ideas--” She leaned in to press a kiss against his lips, “--that I might be--” Another kiss, “--fucking coming back to see you.”

The joy that had resurfaced in his heart felt overwhelming. “I would never,” he told her, his hand gently touching her back once more. The night Jessica left, he walked around the house aimlessly, wondering what happened. Wondering how things went wrong. This was the person he had anticipated spending his life with, but she left. She left because she was unhappy. Because  _ he _ made her unhappy.  _ “You’re just miserable, Paul. I can’t… do it anymore. I can’t help you.” _ Emma looked down at him, eyes scanning over his face, before she let out another chuckle and found herself burying her face into his neck. Maybe she just didn’t know him yet. Maybe he would make her miserable, too. He wasn’t sure about that, though, because after all the years he spent with Jess, he never felt the fluttering in his gut like he did when Emma grinned at him. His arms wrapped around her without a second thought. She felt solid and real against him. Not like the dream he was worried she might be. She was there. With him. In his bed. Buck fucking naked. 

It was a goddamn Christmas miracle.


	9. Life Is Relentless But You're Okay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma gets off from her final shift at the mall and has some thoughts about Paul and auto-piloting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're almost done! I hope you're all enjoying as much as I have been enjoying writing these two freaking fools.

Paul did end up driving back to the bar the next day, so Emma could pick up her car, which had been generously dug out, likely by John himself at some point. They lingered in the parking lot for longer than she had expected. The thought of getting into her car and just following him back to his house crossed her mind, but she knew that wasn’t what was going to happen. She knew that they weren’t going to be trapped in together going forward, and that was going to make things difficult. When there was nowhere else to go, it was easy to stay in one place. Running being an impossibility simplified everything. He had grinned at her over the scarf that was tucked into the collar of his coat. Her heart lurched at the sight, making her feet want to run in the opposite direction as fast as she could.

She sat in the shower at her own place long enough for the water to turn cold that night. Everytime she closed her eyes, she could see his stupid smiling face, and deep down, she didn’t hate that. She barely knew this guy but didn’t hate  _ him. _ Even before she really knew who he was, he was always nice to her for the sake of being nice. There were no words of wooing trapped on his tongue. Maybe he would say a bad joke or two, but it wasn’t ever anything that held any ulterior motive. He was nice just for the sake of being nice. No one that knew her did that for her, let alone someone who was just a regular customer. There was always something beneath the niceties that people led with. They always wanted something. But so far, he didn’t. He was just… black coffee Paul, the nice fucking dude.

Secretly, she hoped that he would initiate some kind of date or something but wasn’t totally shocked when he didn’t. In fact, the only contact they had for the majority of December after their snowed in escapades was either at Beanies or running into each other at the Lakeside Mall. She would see him sitting at the same window table with the little lesbian barista whose name always escaped her. He usually was gently explaining something to the young woman, circling things with his pen on the piece of notebook paper in front of her. Talking quietly in the dull hum of the Barnes & Noble Starbucks. Whenever the girl understood what he was trying to explain, both of their faces washed with relief and then would dissolve into laughter.

He never left without stopping to see her, though. Sometimes, she would even find him wandering the mall without the excuse of calculus tutoring. Not that he ever needed anything in particular. He would just stop by to tell her a stupid joke after following her outside for her fifteen minute break. There would also be the occasional snack. Usually a bagel or some sort of muffin that she would eat quietly between groups of children coming to tell Santa what they wanted for Christmas last minute. She smiled as she nibbled away at blueberry crumb or bits of cinnamon raisin. 

To her utter shock, she found herself calling him a lot of nights just a few days after the snowstorm. Most of the time it was just when she was driving home later at night. The first time was because her car had stalled out twice while she was driving and just wanted some calming company as she attempted to make it home. Of course, he was willing to drive out to wherever she was and grab her, but she insisted she could make it back. When she did, it was strange how difficult it was to get off the phone with him. 

After that night, it became a nightly ritual any time she got stuck in Santa’s goddamn workshop. Just something to help her unwind after back to back shifts at Beanies and the mall. Even still in her stupid elf costume, she found herself grinning from ear to ear while carefully rounding curves and proceeding through intersections.  _ “So you’re an elf and everything. Do you have anything going on for Christmas?” _ The question was posed the weekend before Christmas Day, and it threw her off. She was working at the mall for the holidays but completely forgot that it was right around the corner. In all honesty, she didn’t have any plans. She didn’t admit that, though. No need to have anymore pity thrown her way. Instead, she bluffed about maybe seeing her brother-in-law and nephew, which was unlikely even in her dreams. She returned his question.  _ “Well, I usually do an early dinner on Christmas Eve with Bill and Alice and then breakfast on Christmas Day with them, but Alice is dragging Bill along to something with her girlfriend’s family. So it’ll just be me and Janis this year.” _

"Hey, elf!" She groaned, meaning to keep it internal but letting out more than she intended. It was Christmas fucking Eve, and she was stuck half a day in the goddamn mall. Half a day meaning she was stuck there just into the early evening as the sky was beginning to grow dark. She looked over her shoulder to find the Toy Zone manager hanging out of the half closed entrance to the store. Turning around fully, she gripped a small box with a thin green ribbon wrapped around it in front of her. "Last chance to buy some dignity. Ten percent off!"

She rolled her eyes. "You can suck my giant flopping dick, Frank," she snapped back. Frank Pricely: douchebag extraordinaire. He had been a senior when she was a freshman at Hatchetfield High, always talking about how he was going to become some big wig CEO. She had to admit that back in the day the dude had ambition. Going off to college to get some degree in fuck if she knew. Wanting to take over the world. Flashing bright smiles at every girl who passed. Now, though, the word 'entrepreneur' hung on his tongue every holiday season as he managed the crap out of a Toy Zone. One of three in a twenty mile radius. "And let me know when that whole social media thing gets off the ground, Zuckerberg. I'm sure it'll be any day now."

His face twisted up with a hint of rage. Got him. "At least I'm not some burnout with no plans, no family, and no future, wandering around dressed like a low rent elf," he spat her. For years, she remembered Frank hanging around desperately trying to land a date with Jane. He had even asked her to go to his senior prom with him, which Jane politely declined. She hated him then, and she hated him now just a little more for trying to spit venom at her. "How's your nephew doing these days, Emma? He's been growing up  _ real _ quick. Sure looks a lot like--"

"Shut the fuck up, ass-wipe," she scoffed although the comment about Tim did make her heart hurt a little bit. She hadn't seen her nephew in nearly a year. Tom had allowed her over on the anniversary of Jane's death. She and Tim played Uno and Connect Four well into the night all the way up until he was sent to bed for the night and she was promptly kicked out. Since then, there were always excuses and other obligations that stood in the way every time she reached out. "Why don't you just slither back into whatever dark and lonely hidey hole you crawled out of?"

"At least I have people to spend the holidays with  _ and _ the funds to get them the gifts they deserve," he laughed. "Or are you just going to stick around that poor sap you're stringing along just long enough for him to pay for your next ten year disappearing act."

Heat spread from her gut, through her chest, up her neck, and over her cheeks. There was a tinge of embarrassment that lingered in the pit of her stomach. Something about being attached to someone in any way, shape, or form made her twist and turn with discomfort. The larger part of her, though, was angry with him for bringing up something he knew jack shit about. "You're just bitter because I clearly have something good going for me unlike your sad little life," she sneered, jabbing one finger angrily in his direction. More than anything, a dipshit like Frank Pricely didn’t need to be snooping around in her fucking life. 

As it was, she already had begun to get shit from  _ Zoey _ every time Paul would come in and linger just a little longer than usual.  _ “He’s got a thing for you. You know that, right?” _ The comment was offhanded. Zoey hadn’t even looked up from her phone until Emma tried to brush her comment off. One carefully shaped eyebrow lifted.  _ “You fucked him, huh?” _ She can remember thinking what audacity this little shit had to read her like a fucking book. Honestly, Zoey had been commenting on it for months at that point. Teasing her mercilessly about letting him believe he actually had a chance. She locked her phone and grinned at Emma wickedly.  _ “So what’s black coffee guy’s dick game like?” _

It wasn’t any of Zoey’s business either. What she chose to do in her spare time was no matter to anyone else around her, whether or not that thing she did was absolutely the biggest nerd she ever met. She watched Frank wind up for another stupid response. “Now, I’m going to leave this fucking nightmare place to go spend Christmas Eve… with my boyfriend?” The word came out as more of a question because Paul was not her boyfriend. Just some guy she had been talking to for the past few weeks. She certainly hadn’t been planning on spending Christmas with the guy either, but the slack jaw Frank was sporting at her outburst made it churning that was now going on in her gut worth it. “Go have fun shaving down your mom’s bunions.” She picked up her pace to move toward the exit, desperately just wanting to crawl into her bed with a Big Mac, large fry, and bottle of whiskey. Glancing over her shoulder, she watched him stare right back at her. “Merry fucking Christmas, you asshole.”

\--------

She didn’t know why she ended up where she did. When she bounded out to her car back at the mall, she plopped into the driver’s seat and tossed the box she had been carrying on top of the pile of clothes in the passenger seat. The car roared to life. Maybe not roared. It was more like some kind of power was wheezed out of the old Civic. A humming of protest came from the engine as the heat attempted to kick on. She swore to herself as she shimmied out of her elf costume beneath her steering wheel. At another point in time, she might have been concerned about who would see her half clothed beneath the dim interior lights of her car, but at this point, she couldn’t give less of a shit if Frank wandered out and saw her in her bra. He could still kiss her ass.

By the time she pulled her cream colored sweater over her head, she was fully freezing. Her car was less than reliable in a lot of ways, but heating and cooling were some of its worst qualities. She immediately regretted the leggings she chose to bring with her instead of actual pants. According to the thermometer on her dashboard, it was well below freezing. She could see her breath puffing up around her in taunting clouds. Really, she needed to get a better paying job and then invest in a new car. She wouldn’t have been sitting there chattering after a solid ten minutes with the heat blasting had her car not been an ancient piece of trash.

Tapping her fingers against the steering wheel, she couldn’t bring herself to look up from her lap. It was as if keeping her eyes away from what was in front of her would transport her somewhere else. She wrapped her hands around the wheel, watching her knuckles go from pink to white and then back again. Her eyes finally ripped themselves from her lap to the box beside her. Completely unassuming. A plain brown box wrapped in a green ribbon. She had to admit she did a great job with the ribbon wrapping. That was the only credit she was willing to take at that point.

She had started driving without much thought. It was only meant to be the drive she made daily, so it shouldn’t have taken much brain power. The plan was to coax her clunker into driving back to her apartment. Another Christmas was going to be spent mildly inebriated, waiting by the phone in case Tom finally decided to reach out to her. Spent desperately wishing for some sort of contact from someone. Spent wallowing in the fact that Christmas had been her sister’s favorite holiday. A couple of her acquaintances from school had thrown a rogue ‘ _ merry christmas!’ _ with a bunch of emojis into the group chat. She had closed out of it earlier in the day without a response only to be greeted with a text containing a picture. There was a needlepoint piece with a stick figure-type character beside a line of text also stitched in.  _ ‘I’d love to hang out, but I have to go sit in my house by myself.’ _ She snorted before continuing to the message below.  _ Have a merry Christmas. Don’t party too hard. Santa needs you back to work first thing Monday morning. _ And she had smiled despite her attempts not to. She smiled and continued to do so throughout the day, even as she drove.

A heavy sigh was released. “Okay,” she whispered, pulling her green coat tighter around her. “Okay.” She grabbed the box and pulled herself through her door. “Let’s fucking do it.” Even though she thought the car had been cold inside, a breeze came by to smack a blast of icy air against her cheeks. She burrowed deeper into her coat, nestling into the slouchy neck of her sweater. It felt like a sign that she shouldn’t have been there. Or maybe it was just a sign that it was fucking winter, so obviously it was going to be cold out. Either way, she was pretty sure her hands were shaking. Whether it was from nervousness or the cold, she couldn’t be entirely positive.

She stepped up a set of stairs onto a front porch, taking in the decor of the sprawling space. A set of wicker chairs on either side of a small table, which held a flower pot atop it. On the opposite side, there was a bench swing. Its cushions had been removed, but there was still a whisper of what could be a quiet summer evening spent with a couple of beers on that porch in that swing. She shook her head before turning to face the door. For a moment, she raised her hand to give it a couple of raps but decided against it, pressing her knuckle against the door bell instead.

A soft glow came from inside and there was another car outside, so she was fairly certain someone was home. A part of her, though, was hoping that was incorrect, and no one would come at the sound of the bell. Then she would make her way back to her apartment as planned to spend another Christmas drunk and stupid. The light flicking on beyond the door put a damper in that thought. A loud squeal accompanied the opening of the door. Light flooded over her, rendering her incapable of seeing who was staring at her from the house. Another light switch sounded, followed by a light on the porch coming to life. “Emma?” The voice was confused as she expected it would be. 

With eyes squinted, she looked up with an embarrassed grin on her face. Paul stood in a red sweater before her, still in the khakis he had likely been wearing earlier. “Yeah,” she muttered with a shrug. “I know you were just going to be laying low, but I… I mean,  _ honestly _ I don’t know what I’m doing here. I wish I had some kind of fucking explanation for you. I just--”

“Did you… um… want to come in?” he offered in an attempt to break up her panicked rambling. She nodded while stepping through the threshold. Once he swung the door closed with another groan from its hinges, she felt the warmth of the house wrapping around her. She kicked off her shitty Converse to lay haphazardly beside a pair of his dress shoes. “Can I get you anything? Did you want something to drink… or eat? Or… okay?”

The box had been thrust at his chest. “This is for you,” she muttered, unwilling to look at him. She was afraid if she did that she would be all consumed by the blue of his eyes, and she wasn’t ready to be completely pulled into the orbit of some fucking guy she slept with once… okay, a couple of times, but it was all in one day so the point still stood. “I saw it at the mall and thought you might like it. But it’s… like, not a big fucking deal or anything.” The feeling in her chest was like heartburn on steroids. She was fairly sure she was either going to cry or vomit. There was no need or real reason for the way she was feeling, and it wasn’t even the first time she had felt this way.

The real first time she had realized he made her feel like she might explode was one night when she was driving home. Her phone had been sitting in her lap on speaker phone. All he was doing was talking about his day at work after she had spent a full thirty minutes sitting in the parking lot complaining about the back to back Beanies and Santa’s Workshop shifts.  _ “And then, get this, I walk in to give my boss the reports, and I shit you not, he’s in there on the phone with his wife having phone sex.” _ She burst into a fit of laughter. As she checked both directions at a very empty four way intersection after coming to a full stop, she told him he had to be bullshitting her.  _ “I swear to god. The guy had his hand on his throat asking… fucking Carol if he had been a bad boy. Emma, stop laughing. This was the most mortifying day of my life. It’s only funny because you weren’t there. I’m never going to be the same again.” _ It had been a long time since anyone made her laugh like that. Tears had started to roll down her cheeks, which were sore from smiling so much. He could be heard letting out a light chuckle.  _ “But I’m really glad my suffering could make you laugh. It sounded like your day was kind of shitty, so I’m happy to help.” _ The smile remained but the fluttering in her gut seemed to spread all over her body.

He pulled carefully at the ribbon, moving the pieces aside to keep it intact but also open the parcel. She bit down on the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling or screaming. Which one it was going to be was still up in the air. She sucked in a breath while he opened the top flap of the box to examine what was inside. It really was just a silly thing. There was no reason she needed to get him anything. She was prepared to explain herself poorly when a small grin crossed his face. He pulled a coffee mug from the box. On it, there was a realistic drawn crab smoking a cigarette above the line  _ ‘Life is relentless.’ _ “This is awesome,” he chuckled, turning the mug over in his hand. He looked over to her, smile growing wider. “I love it.”

She exhaled heavily. “Really?” she spat out without a second thought. Of course he loved it. She knew he would. Although she really didn’t know him, she saw the coffee mug in the window of a novelty shop and knew immediately it was something she had to get for him. Why had she been so nervous? Why was she so afraid of being rejected? There was no logic in that. If anything, she would be the one doing the rejecting, so why was the thought of him turning her away at the door making her so upset. 

“Really,” he assured her, looking from her to the mug. “It’s great.” His eyes scanned over the image again, resulting in a low chuckle. “It’ll be a nice break from the other ones. It was a set I got a few years back, so I figured I might as well use it. But  _ this--” _ he lifted the mug, “--this is great.”

“It sounded like something you’d think after dealing with your buddy with the mustache all day,” she explained. It really did. She saw the text and knew no matter what the picture that went with it was she still had to get this stupid mug for this stupid dude. He rolled his eyes. “Well, if he isn’t your fucking friend, why’d you go out for drinks with him last weekend?”

“In my defense, he would have tried to drive home drunk, and I couldn’t have that weighing on my conscience,” he argued as he waved the mug around. “Also Ted paid for drinks, so it’s not like I spent my own money on that idiot.”

She narrowed her eyes, a sense of comfort beginning to wash over her. “Uh huh, keep telling yourself that, bub,” she responded, crossing her arms. “If he’s not your friend, he’s clearly your lover.” He groaned but there was still a whisper of a grin on his face. “Oh, come on, Paul. He may be a fucking idiot, but he’s  _ your _ fucking idiot.”

“Jesus Christ,” he mumbled before he looked back down at her. “You know, you keep inviting yourself over to my house and insulting me.” He placed the mug back into the box and placed it on a table where his keys sat in a small bowl. “This just doesn’t seem fair.”

Shrugging, she smirked up at him. “I don’t know, dude,” she sighed, letting her arms fall back to her sides. “I’m like a fucking vampire. You just keep inviting me in, so now I guess I have to stay.”

His eyebrows raised. “Oh, so now you’re inviting yourself to stay over?” he mused, raking a hand through his hair. He looked a little less put together than she would normally see him now that she really got to take him in. A little tired too. Like she had maybe woken him up from a nap when she rang the bell. There was less product in his chestnut hair, so it flopped down over his forehead a little more. “Unbelievable. Do you think just because you know Santa you can just do whatever you want?”

“Actually, that’s  _ exactly _ what I think. That’s actually written in the handbook,” she played into his dumb joke. The smile reached his eyes, lighting them up like fireworks on the Fourth of July. She returned the expression. “It specifically says--and I’m paraphrasing a little here--that if you’re an elf you’re allowed to do whatever the fuck you want on off hours.”

There was no snippy comeback from him this time. He simply shook his head with a look of disbelief crossing his features. “Unbelievable,” he repeated just under his breath. He moved a step closer to her. Without giving her a chance to even flinch, he had a hand on her cheek and was dipping his head down to hers. Her heart hammered in her chest when he stopped what he was doing to pull back and look at her again. “Is… uh… this alright?”

Despite the voice in her head screaming at her to run away from him, she found herself leaning into the hand on her cheek and staring into his eyes. Like someone had just poured out two pools of sky blue paint. The bluest blue she had ever seen. A blue that could swallow her whole, yet it allowed her to be there to comfortably wade through its depths. “Yeah,” she whispered. He was close enough that her lips could have brushed against him if she just shifted slightly. The scent of beer danced across her face. She couldn’t help but grin regardless of the sirens going off in her mind. “This is good.”

So he kissed her.

And for once, she was finally enjoying her Christmas.


	10. It's Not Like Jesus Can Even Hear You On His Birthday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paul gets drunk on eggnog. Emma likes to wear his clothes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are! It's the end!

_Three Years Later_

Paul anxiously glanced down at his watch before allowing his eyes to dart around the room. His leg bounced up and down. “People are going to be here any minute,” he mumbled, more to himself than anything else. No one was in the kitchen with him as he buzzed with nervous energy. He looked at the watch again. It was a habit he had picked up since the thing was gifted to him. Constantly looking at the time. Perpetually worried about running late even for things that had no set time frame. Part of him wanted to kill the person who gave it to him, but the other part _did_ appreciate not having to dig his phone out every time he was getting antsy about what time it was.

The house felt warmer the past few years than it had when he moved in. Color started to make its way over everything. Decorations started to appear at various spots in rooms. Candles lit at various times to bring just a little extra light to the space. Bowls filled with decorative dried wood and flowers that smelled absolutely divine. Pictures on walls both of art and of actual people in his life. Hell, even the cabinets in the kitchen changed from an oaky brown to a rich mahogany in color at least. He had learned a lot about wood staining in the past year. Information of which he would likely never use ever again, but he was happy to listen.

What was the biggest change that came about approximately two years earlier was the return of the Christmas tree in his house. There had been a period of time where Christmas was soured at least personally for him. The thoughts of heartbreak and confusion surrounded the day, making it difficult to truly appreciate it. Prior to Jessica leaving, he had loved Christmas. There was something that filled his heart with glee at the lights and the colors. Once he moved into his own place, he had been so excited to have a tree of his own. Hell, he had even set up a sad little Charlie Brown Christmas tree up in his dorm back during his college days, but after Jess left, things felt different. Tainted. Remembering her eyes shining with excitement in the light of the Christmas tree versus the dull anger in them when she left made his guts twist with remorse.

However, there was now a tree posted up in the corner of the living room. It shined proudly across the space, glowing lightly in the reflection of the sliding glass door. A simple set of multicolored ornaments hung from the branches of the real tree, as was the request when he set out to get one. He had spent more than he initially wanted to on the base set of ornaments, but seeing how they hung from the tree, lights shining through them like tiny snow globes, he felt a little more at peace with the purchase. Amongst the mostly clear ornaments, were six different bulbs that didn’t match the rest. One was holographic with _‘HORSE PEOPLE’_ printed along the one side. Another was a glittery apple pie. The third was a pearlescent set of eggs and bacon. Then a shimmering bag of coffee beans. A graduation cap lined with dark chunky glitter. And finally, a beautifully hand painted blue jay. Even though he was panicking at the thought of being unprepared for company, he smiled at the sight of the tree. 

Footsteps pounded down the stairs, through the foyer, and into the kitchen. “Jesus Christ, chill the fuck out. I swear if you keep shaking your leg like that I’m going to chop it right off,” Emma grumbled while straightening out the red sweater she had decided on after her outrageously long shower. He blinked as she passed and moved directly toward the fridge. She had moved in very quietly. So many of her things had made their way over as the days went on. She spent less and less time at her own apartment, coming over after class or work. He had been sitting at the island with her as she rifled through notes from her Taxonomy and Anatomy of Intermountain Flora course. There were tiny detailed drawings of various plants. A few were drawn in a way that she could scribble in barely legible diagramming for her own benefit. Her legs were drawn up to her chest and hair in a pile on top of her head as she jotted something down on one of the papers. _“Hey.”_ She looked up with furrowed brows. He swallowed down hard on his tea. _“Do you… want to move in here… with me? If you want, of course. Only if you want.”_ He was watching her again nearly two years later while she pulled a beer out of the fridge. She nudged the door closed with her hip and swiftly moved to a draw to pull out a bottle opener. Glancing up, she smirked at him. “What’re you looking at, nerd?”

She had agreed to move in with much more excitement than he had anticipated, and somehow, the big lonely house felt more like home. Their home. “Um, nothing,” he blabbered. It was very untrue. He was very clearly just staring at her. It was something he did often. Each and every time, though, she liked to give him a hard time about it. “Is that my sweater?” Her brows raised before she looked down at the shirt and shrugged. “That’s my sweater. The one that you said was so ugly.”

Another shrug. “What can I say? I guess it just looks better on me,” she replied while taking a sip of her beer. He didn’t disagree but did notice that more and more of his clothing was worn by her as time went on. Days around the house would be spent in his old t-shirts. Cold nights in his sweaters or sweatshirts. They swam on her, but she looked so damn comfortable in each and every garment. He couldn’t even be angry that he had to do laundry twice as often. “Don’t hate the playa. Hate the game, motherfucker.”

He snorted. “And you have the balls to call me a nerd?” he scoffed. Something in particular that seemed to stem from being around her more often was his ability to actually take and give shit. It was a little difficult to remember the days where he was unable to keep up with Ted’s dumbassery or go toe-to-toe with Alice’s quick wit. He returned her smug grin as her jaw dropped slightly, brow arched. He nodded, eyes going wide. “Oh yeah, you heard me, nerd.”

Placing her beer onto the counter behind her, she marched over to the other side of the island. She stood close to him, still shorter than him as he sat on one of the stools. “Want to say that to my face, nerd?” she asked. Her breath tickled his face. Beer and gingerbread. There were cookies and other snacks spread out across the island. She snuck one of the gingerbread men, walking away with both middle fingers raised when he chided her for taking it. “If you’ve got the fucking guts.”

He leaned down to just about press his nose against hers. “You’re a nerd, nerd,” he whispered without breaking eye contact. One of the first nights they spent together after she had accidentally slipped up and called him her boyfriend in front of some of her friends from class, she laid on her side with her fingertips trailing along the side of his face. A quiet and soft moment he didn’t often get to see from her at that point. _“I think it was your eyes.”_ He had narrowed his eyes at her in the dim light of the early morning. They had nothing to do that lazy Saturday, and they hadn’t seen each other all week. So most of the night had been spent catching up on their weeks and talking about nothing. He asked her what she meant. _“It was your eyes that got me. Because--and this is going to sound certifiably fucking nuts--I felt like I knew them from somewhere. Probably Beanies or some shit like that. Or maybe because you were my fucking paperboy growing up.”_ He chuckled as she laid her palm flat against his cheek. Her own eyes scanned over his face. She let her eyes slide shut, sighing. _“Fucking hell. I’ve got it_ so _bad for you, you dumbass motherfucker.”_

“I guess I’m just going to have to beat you up,” she hummed, stepping slightly closer toward him. “After school. Three o’clock by the jungle gym. I’m going to beat the crap out of you in front of all your friends, kid.” She was still grinning up at him with her hands perched on her hips. His heart skipped a beat in his chest. When she started insisting that they took pictures together, he wasn’t entirely sure what to do. He wasn’t exactly someone to document his life. Even in the posed family pictures from when he was a kid, he looked like the most uncomfortable little noodle in the midst of his happy photogenic brothers. But when that first picture went up on Facebook, he suddenly looked at home in his own skin. She had taken them on a hike. At the apex of the trail, overlooking the island and the entirety of the Witchwood Forest, she set up her camera on a timer and ran back to his side, jabbing him in the ribs. _“Come on. Get those fucking pearly whites out, Paul.”_ And he did. The biggest most genuine smile he ever had documented. His face was red and sweaty from the hike beforehand. He gazed down at her with that bright smile on his lips. Her expression mirrored his. He had said something in response to her demands, which sent her into a fit of laughter. The camera snapped at the precipice of pure joy. 

“What would you be proving? It’s not like Bill doesn’t already think you could beat the shit out of both of us with your pinky.” She took her turn to exhale a light chuckle. “But I guess if you really want to, you can beat me up.”

She arched a brow. “Is that what you’re into, slim?” she mused, smoothing her hands against his chest. “Didn’t take you for the chains and whips kind of guy, but I guess you’ve still got surprises in you yet.” She admitted often that he had so many more surprises in him than she had expected. The most shocking of all, she eventually made clear, was how much fun she had doing absolutely nothing with him. She told him often about how restless she was most of her life. How she couldn’t wait to get onto the next thing. Start the next garbage job. Move onto the next meaningless place. Yet sitting there with him shooting the shit on a Friday night was more fun than going out and making fun of drunk karaoke singers. “Unless you’re talking about being chained down to me and totally fucking _whipped.”_

The doorbell rang. He moved to get up from the chair but she moved forward, almost landing into his lap. “Em, come on,” he urged as he attempted to move again to no avail. “Someone’s here.” The only other person who called her Em had been Jane. She made that abundantly clear the first time it slipped out of his mouth. It was offhanded while they sat on opposite sides of the couch. She was typing away on her laptop. He had his nose in a book. His fingers gently wrapped around the ankle of the leg that extended out toward him. _“Hey, Em? What do you think about dropping by the mall this weekend?”_ She froze as if she had just been asked to eat a handful of live bees. The explanation came out of her mouth before he had the chance to ask what was wrong. _“Emma, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I won’t--”_ Stopping him, she pressed her laptop shut before crawling across the couch to curl up in his lap. There weren’t many words exchanged after that aside from telling him it was okay. “Emma.”

“Stupid nice mouth tax,” she responded simply, grinning something wicked. The doorbell sounded again. “Come on, kid. Our guests are getting cold out there. Just pay up.” He stared down at her. She looked exactly the same as she did that first day he walked into Beanies. As she did the day he ran into her outside the mall. As she did the first morning he woke up to her sleeping soundly beside him. Jaw sharp and still lingering with the tan from the summer. All the days spent outside in the sun where he just burned always ended in a glorious golden tan for her. Delicate bow of a mouth always turned up into some kind of grin. Usually something teasing. Sometimes, though, the smile would be soft. Fond of what or whoever she was gazing upon. And those eyes. Deep chocolate pools that went on for eons. He could stare at them all day, always finding something new but familiar all at once. Like rediscovering his favorite song after many years. “Let’s go, beefcake.”

His lips found hers, intending to be brief, but even when she had moved enough for him to get by, he found himself leaning into the kiss. Just as magical as the first one in that same kitchen. Her palms landed on his cheeks. Cool and comforting. The door swung open. “Dude, it’s cold out there!” Alice shouted, cheeks pink from the chilled air. “I can’t believe you guys are making out instead of answering your freaking door.” Bill trailed in behind her with a brown bag with red and gold and green wrapped boxes inside, gently closing the door behind him. She gestured to the large jars in her hands. “The cider’s going to be so cold!”

Emma pulled away from Paul to look the young woman directly in the eyes. “Listen, I told him there was someone at the door,” she explained with a shrug. “He just can’t help himself. I’m too--”

He shoved her shoulder. “I hate you,” he grumbled, moving to help Bill with whatever was weighing the bag in his hand down. 

“No you don’t, but I appreciate the sentiment!” He threw his head back with a groan and heard her laugh in response. It was as welcome as the sound of birds chirping early on a spring morning. Joyful and full of life. “Can you believe that guy trying to say he hates me? What a fucking chump, am I right?” Alice chuckled at the statement, humming some sort of agreement.

Grabbing the bag from Bill, he watched his friend open his mouth to give some sort of greeting filled with Christmas cheer. “What the _hell_ is that?” Alice gasped, overshadowing whatever her father was going to say. He and Bill shared a look of concern and confusion before turning over to where Alice had been freaking out. “What the fuck is--”

“Alice, come on,” Bill sighed, shoulders heaving. He was always a little down and exhausted with life for as long as Paul had known him. Like Eeyore had been given more inflection in his voice. Bill meant well in everything he did but had the tendency to be short sighted with things, particularly when it came to Alice. It took her going to college across the country to get him to accept the whole Deb thing. When it came to Alice, the issue was never girls. He never took issue with her liking women. It was the same act he would have put on for any guy she brought home: no one was ever good enough for her. “It’s Christmas. Can’t you watch the language just today?”

She tossed her eyes over her shoulder at him. “What? Jesus died? It’s not like he’s going to hear me,” she replied without skipping a beat, sending a snort out of Emma before she could stop it. Paul’s eyes widened at her and she shrugged in response. Alice looked back to her. “Plus, we’re at Paul and Emma’s. Do you _really_ think once the liquor starts going that Emma is going to keep the language PG?” Bill sighed again. “ _Plus,_ Ted will no doubt be showing up too late to be fashionable. Probably already drunk. It was wishful thinking that the language might not be--”

“Al, give him a break,” Paul urged, watching Bill’s face fall with each word. He went to church every Sunday morning. Never one to talk about any sort of faith with his friends, Paul was aware that it was important to him. “It’s Christmas! Let’s just--”

“You!” she shouted, pointing directly at him. She grabbed Emma’s wrist and waved the hand attached in his direction. “What in the fresh…” Her words trailed off as did her eyes toward Bill. “Heck is this?”

Bill’s shoulders perked and his expression lit up. “Paul,” he gasped, grabbing Paul’s elbow in emphasis. “You didn’t?”

Paul scratched the back of his neck, locking eyes with Emma, who wore the usual smug grin. “Um, no, I didn’t,” he admitted. Between Bill and Alice, a number of unintelligible noises came out as they gestured at Emma then to Paul then between each other. She waved Emma’s hand around, a newly familiar shine glinting in the overhead lighting. “No, I’m serious. I didn’t.”

“Don’t be shy, Paul,” Bill insisted, an excitement rising in his voice. A hand clapped down on Paul’s shoulder. “How’d you do it?”

Paul sighed, running his own hand over his face. When his eyes opened again, Emma was watching him expectantly, a brow raised with vague interest. “I _didn’t,”_ he insisted. “She was digging through my underwear drawer and proposed to herself!”

Emma took her turn to widen her eyes. “Excuse me for liking those boxers you never fucking wear. They’re fucking comfortable to wear around the house,” she argued, glancing to Bill. “Sorry, Bill.” It wasn’t a lie. She had been digging through the drawer with the intention of finding said boxers. He sat on the bed with his back against the headboard, buried in a book. It was a typical evening. They were both home from work for dinner and had cooked together. He was meticulous and careful when chopping up and getting together ingredients, and she was great with putting it all together. It was a good team. _They_ were a good team. His head had been spinning slightly from an extra large glass (or two) of wine he had with dinner. _“Hey,”_ she called out from his dresser. When he looked up, he had expected some kind of silly face or joke to be made at his expense. He nearly fell off the bed when he saw the ring clasped between his fingers. It was left to him when his grandmother had died a few years prior. A moderately sized diamond bordered by two sapphires. He held onto it not even thinking he was going to need it after Jess left. It sat in a box in his closet for a long time but moved to the back of his underwear drawer after Emma moved in. _“This for me?”_ He blathered out how he hadn’t been planning on springing the question on her and that he was just hanging onto it. _“So… it’s_ not _for me?”_ Another string of telling her that it _was_ in fact for her. A fact that he hadn’t even truly admitted to himself. He hadn’t been looking to commit like that to another person ever again, but the thought of committing to anyone who wasn’t her felt like a sentence worse than death. _“Well, okay then.”_ His heart hammered in his chest as he had watched her slide the ring onto the exact finger he had unknowingly pictured her wearing it on when he slipped the small velvet back into that drawer. “You need to get better at hiding your shit!”

“Well, stop wearing all my clothes!”

“ _You_ like it when I wear your clothes!”

“I know that!” He had been trying to sound aggravated but found himself smiling. He usually did. Rare were the moments she didn’t make him smile. There was something that felt serendipitous about her. Like he had just so happened to pass her by and fall deeply and madly in love with some crabby mall elf, but the idea of fate was on his mind more often than not when he actually thought about it. All the passes by they must have had over the years. As her paperboy. Going to adjacent high schools. Possibly having mutual friends. The terrible _Brigadoon_ fiasco of Sycamore bussing their kids over to Hatchetfield High to watch their musical. Then Beanies, a discovery only made when the Starbucks on his way to work was under construction. And finally all those nights spent tutoring Alice where they were just across a mall from one another. At some point, coincidences stopped feeling like happy accidents and more like destiny stepping in and pushing them in the right direction. Hell, even Janis stopped howling at night in that empty bedroom, which Emma took up as a little studio for what she described as ‘passionate doodling’. He had insisted upon it and felt a shiver run down his back at the realization that Janis was finally at peace in the night, curling up between them in bed.

People continued to shuffle in. Paul’s friends from work. Ted of course came in half drunk, as Alice had predicted, but he was happy to be there. He almost got misty eyed when thanking Paul for inviting him. Despite his clear discomfort at the close emotional contact and sloppy drunk hug, he was secretly touched that Ted would be so honored to be invited. A fact he would admit later that night after many glasses of egg nog. Even Tom and Tim stopped by, accompanied by Becky Barnes, which irked Emma immensely. But all things considered, she bit her tongue and made pleasant conversation with the woman she once upon a time had a one-sided rivalry with. 

A soft tinkering of Christmas music played from a speaker in the living room but was difficult to hear over all the chatter. It was the fullest the house had been in a number of years. He wasn’t one to have company over. She, on the other hand, loved to host. Thrived being around a group of people. Regardless of her general distaste for people, she really did seem comfortable in a crowded room. Though he wasn’t such a fan of socializing, he really did love to watch her float around a room, laughing and joking. While she hadn’t changed a whole lot in the few years he had known her, there was a sense of joy that seemed to mirror his own. An overwhelming feeling of contentment when she would curl around his back, throwing an arm around his middle and pressing a soft kiss against the side of his neck. A small reminder that she didn’t feel trapped. She didn’t need to run. That things were good.

He found himself chatting with his brother a lot of the night. It was a rekindling of a relationship encouraged by her. After making it clear that he didn’t want much if anything at all to do with his family, she still pushed him. He mentioned that the brother just older than he was, Jack, was the only person he regretted losing touch with. They had gotten along well enough as kids, always on the less fortunate end of the punching bag together. After an unfortunate Memorial Day barbeque, the brothers had stayed vaguely in touch. Texting on occasion that turned into grabbing dinner every now and then. Eventually, it became a regular thing for Jack to end up at his little brother’s house on a Friday night to shoot the shit.

Several beers and nogs into his night, he gazed out over the small crowd of family and friends gathered mostly in the kitchen and living room. Spread out chattering amongst themselves. A warm feeling came over him. It was as though he was in one of those shitty Christmas movies where everything seemed to work out too easily. Where everything was good and perfect and right. To be fair, a lot of his life did feel that way. Mostly because he, the plain old normal black coffee guy, somehow got the girl. Well, got wasn’t the correct term really. He was simply being allowed space in her life and was fortunate enough to have her in his own. A give and take. A joyful symbiotic life. 

His eyes found her off toward the side of the kitchen just watching over everything going on. He rested a hand gently on Bill’s shoulder to excuse himself before bobbing and weaving between people. Once he was close enough for her to notice, she looked up at him while taking a sip of her drink through a smile. “Hey,” he greeted, a wave of relief washing over him to just be near her. He sidled up next to her at the counter. “Are you okay?” A gulp of eggnog ran down his throat, warm like a summer evening in his chest. 

She looked up at him, tilting her head to the side as though she were trying to decipher his face. “Yeah, I’m good,” she told him as she scooted closer to him. “This is nice.” Her eyes moved out over the crowd of people. Something in her eyes was almost nostalgic watching _their_ friends and _their_ family meander about _their_ house. (He was always _very_ excited to use the term ‘their’ to describe things with them.) “I haven’t had this in a _very_ long time.” Taking another swig of her drink, she kept her focus on the crowd. There was a melancholic look that came over her. “My parents used to have the whole fucking family over. Aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, the whole fucking thing.” She brought her gaze back to him with a sad smile, jutting her chin out at his glass. “Loli… my, uh, grandma used to make that. I wasn’t _supposed_ to be drinking it, but Jane used to sneak us some while people were too busy paying attention to me being a little asshole. It’s like eggnog but so much better.” He chuckled without moving his eyes from her. “I think Jane would have liked you. You’re just the kind of nerd she would have been over the goddamn moon to see me hanging around.”

A hand ran up his back, nails trailing slowly down his spine. “Well, I really hope she would have,” he replied. She had the tendency to fall into lulls of sadness around this time of year. It was just before Christmas a few years earlier when she got the call her sister had been killed in a car crash. There was still a little raw emotion associated with the holiday. He could see it in the vacant stares. In the reddened eyes as she walked through the door after a day at work. In the quiet labored breaths at night. “It’s okay to not be okay, Em.”

A bittersweet grin came over her. She shook her head. “I _am_ okay,” she explained, taking a deep breath in before continuing all while looking back out at her nephew and brother-in-law chatting with Alice. “I just always _thought_ if I came back and did this whole… family shit that Jane would be here, but she’s not and that feels a little weird I guess.” The longer he knew her, the more she spoke of her sister. Of the dichotomy between the two of them. How Jane was so good while she was an absolute demon of a child. How they were best friends until she moved more toward acting out as a teenager while Jane was all straight A’s and rule abiding. How Jane had been heartbroken when she decided to leave for Guatemala. How Jane had invited her to each and every event in the hopes that she would come home. She let out a heavy sigh, pressing her lips together in a tight line. She glanced back to him. “I guess family is a little weird, though.”

He narrowed his eyes. “How do you figure?” he wondered. It didn’t seem like something that was so weird at all. It was pretty straight forward. Very nuclear and normal. Mothers. Fathers. Aunts. Uncles. Cousins. Grandparents. Sons and daughters. Relationships and personalities would be what made them weird, but he was fairly sure that wasn’t what she was getting at.

The grin was returning to her lips as she leaned into him. “Well, sometimes your family it like… a fucking mom and dad and brothers and sisters,” she began, nodding her head along with each item on her list. With each word her smile became more evident. “But _sometimes_ your family can be some nerd and a cat and a funky little lesbian and her stuffy dad. Also we can adopt Melissa, too. She’s cool as shit. I like her.”

He blinked, ignoring everything after alluding to Janis and him. The two of them being a part of her family. “ _I’m_ your family?” he breathed, eyes wide and mouth slightly agape. He had been with Jessica for the better part of a decade. She met his entire fucked up family and knew a lot of the darker and less friendly parts of him. They told each other they loved one another and went about the motions of what they were supposed to do, but she, not once, called him her family. Hell, he was pretty sure she never even made it as his emergency contact. He knew now, though, that if anything happened. Emma would be the first person to call because she would be kicking down hospital doors to find him.

She scoffed. “Of course you’re my family, you fucking dweeb,” she laughed as if he had missed something obvious. She lifted her hand up to him, his late grandmother’s ring flashing right in front of her face. “I said yes, didn’t I?”

“No, you said ‘okay’,” he corrected. “ _And_ I never asked you.”

A second of seriousness hit her features. “You didn’t really need to,” she admitted. Their eyes were locked together. He could remember so many days heading into the office wondering about the mean girl behind the counter at Beanies. What she liked to do in her free time (a lot of “passionate doodling” and tending to a garden she had cultivated in the backyard after moving in). How she took her coffee (black with two sugars). Where she was from (Hatchetfield which was the “ _worst fucking place on the entire planet but wasn’t_ quite _as bad”_ since she got back). Yet here he was, knowing her. Being with her day in and day out. _Loving_ her. The serious look in her eyes left as quickly as it arrived, and she rolled her eyes. “Oh, don’t look at me like that.”

“Like… you know what? No,” he landed on. She arched a brow, a grin twinging at the corners of her lips. “No, I’m going to keep looking at you like that because _you_ make me very happy, and it’s Christmas. And I think that’s great. I think _you’re_ great.”

“I think you’re drunk,” she teased, poking his side.”

His face burned red. Mostly because she was correct. “No, I’m _not,”_ he shot back. It was the least convincing lie he had ever come out with. Which was saying a lot because he couldn’t lie to save his life. 

“Oh Jesus,” she groaned. Her palm wrapped around the back of his neck. “Get over here, you absolute fucking ding dong.” Every time they touched there was electricity. Something that made him feel like he was coming back to life. Like she was a set of jumper cables that came in to save his sad quiet life. She was a string of Christmas lights that wrapped herself around him to bring so much joy back into his days. Everything was better with her around, and he would never be able to thank him enough.

Then she kissed him as Frank Sinatra crooned about a merry little Christmas off in the background, and he felt like he could see the next twenty lifetimes he wished he could spend with her.

He smiled because things were good.

They were good.

 _She_ was good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been so much fun! Thank you so much for reading along and indulging me on this lil tangent! <3 :D


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